Part Three
"All right," said Rose, trying to sound as indignant as possible. She was a bit indignant, actually. These people were falling right into her hands, and if it was all too easy, she'd never be able to brag to the Doctor how she single handedly rescued him from a fate worse than... Well, a fate worse than domestic, really, because all in all, it didn't sound too bad to her. She figured that was the atmosphere talking and tried to firmly put it out of her mind. "You're saying you want me to go in the box with him, and see if I can get him to 'respond.'" She put air quotes around "respond" because it helped with the indignant bit.
They beamed at her. "Exactly. We'll be observing of course, so you'll be completely safe."
"Um. With a Time Lord who's been drugged into insensibility." She grinned. "I'm not worried about my safety, I'm worried about him being... insensible."
"Do you think that would present a problem?"
"Honestly? Yes. But if we're just seeing if he likes me, I suppose it would be the easiest way to go about it."
"Oh, good," said Dr. Abbot, and stood up to shake her hand. "Dr. Tyler, it's a privilege to have you join us. As a woman of science, myself, I can understand that it must be very strange for you to attempt an experiment like this."
Rose laughed. "We used to do experiments like this all the time when we were younger. Only we called them pulling."
Dr. Abbot giggled. "How well I remember," she agreed. "Still, he is reciting poetry at you. Perhaps you remind him of this 'Rose' he talks about."
"Hope so." She straightened her suit coat, feeling the firm weight of the sonic screwdriver against her hip. "Well," she said. "Here goes nothing."
Then she had a quick thought. "They probably won't breed in captivity, so I'd suggest we kind of dim the lights and stuff. Sort of... set the mood?" She tried very hard not to giggle, but Dr. Abbot looked like she was about to join Rose in girlish laughter. Dr. Krishin thumped his tail against his chair and beamed at them.
They let her into the box moments later, then dimmed the lights and left the room. She found the Doctor still sitting in his chair, now looking quite sulky and bored. He was obviously fighting off the effect of the drug, but she could tell by his wide eyes that kept staring quite through her that he hadn't got there yet.
"Hello," she said. "I'm Doctor Tyler."
"Come to help me repopulate my species?" he said, but he didn't sound too thrilled. Not that she'd wanted him to sound thrilled. Thrilled Doctor meant bad things, because it meant he liked the idea and would be willing to do everything in his considerable power to see to it. Which would be bad because... because...
Well, she knew she'd had a good reason earlier and whatever it was, it would have to do.
"Well... why don't we talk about that?"
"Because we never talk about that," he said. "Told you I don't do domestic. I'd sit the kid down in the Console Room and turn around to tell off some mad despot, and the child would have rewired the immediately essential part of the TARDIS into a fizzy drink dispenser before I got to the surrender or die bit."
"Wow," she said.
"You can't leave Gallifreyan kids anywhere near technology. I went to a funfair when I was really young, and there was this girl, and she accused me and my mates of wanting to take apart the ferris wheel."
"OK," said Rose, rather baffled at this odd revelation about his childhood.
"We probably would have done," he added sheepishly.
"Well, that would be a problem," she agreed, fighting off a grin from her mind's image of a teenaged Doctor. For some reason, he had dark hair.
"Then of course, there's Jack. I'd have to say something like 'Kids, this is your Uncle Jack. Except on Tuesdays, then he's your Aunt Jack.'"
Rose laughed at that one, unable to help herself picturing the Captain's dubious expression in her head.
He smiled back at her. "I'd stand and play proper host, but everything looks funny right now, and I really wouldn't advise you to back up."
"Why?"
"There's a pink elephant right behind you, and it appears to be trying to sing Wagner. You can never tell them that Wagner's not for beginners or elephants, they just take one look at the latest Brunhilda and have to give it a go."
She grinned and walked over to him, putting a hand out to touch his cheek.
"Wouldn't your mother object to me impregnating you?" he asked. "Aside from the age difference, I mean." He smirked. "I can almost hear her now. Which would be bad, come to think of it, because if she knew this had been suggested, I'd be able to hear her from here anyway. Even without the radio receivers I used to call ears."
Rose just grinned and took his arm. "Why didn't you just go inside and hide?"
"She's mad at me and won't let me in and besides they locked her away, and the rest is so terribly secret because I can't be stupid and give everything away. Even if I feel really incredibly stupid at the moment."
"I am never, ever going to let you forget you said that."
"C'mon, let's go, I have to go look up Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart and tell your mother he said she looked stupid in peach."
"Why?" she asked, helping him across the room, carefully so as to seem extremely non-chalant.
"So she'll slap him," he said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "I can't hit him, he's a friend!"
"But you'll set my mum on him?" She rolled her eyes. "Hope he's poor and married."
"Don't step on that, I don't know what it is, and that's saying something."
She looked down and, not seeing anything, just kept moving.
"And don't you love the Gallifreyan decor in this place? S'perfect - right down to being watched all the bloody time. Try setting 615."
She nodded, pulled out the screwdriver, and touched it to setting 615. There was an agonized whine from somewhere overhead, like a speaker about to be sung through by her mum, drunk. "Let's go, Doctor," she said.
"I'm not the Doctor, right now," he said. "The Doctor is out, or you're the Doctor, one or the other, can't be too sure. Must be the suit. Coulda sworn I was wearing it earlier, but it looks surprisingly good on you. Actually, it'd look better on the floor, but we'll ignore that, shall we, for the moment? Let's get to the TARDIS, best place to repopulate my species. Can you imagine it, a ship full of tiny Rose Tylers."
"Only with your bloody cheek, no doubt," she huffed. "I'll never be able to get a word in edgewise again for the rest of my life."
"Could be worse. Could be little Jackies."
"Don't make me smack you."
"Watch out for the tree," he suggested.
She walked non-chalantly through the tree only he could see.
"Can't get this bloody door unlocked," she said grimly, referring to the glass box around the TARDIS.
"Turn it inside out," he suggested, unhelpfully.
The doors started flying open in the lab. Somewhere in the building, Rose imagined she could hear sirens going off.
"Time to run," he said, caught her hand, and, with a quick flick of her wrist where she held the screwdriver, opened the door to the box.
Rose stuffed the key into the TARDIS door and they flung it open, just as Doctor Abbot and Doctor Krishin came bursting into the lab, looking quite betrayed.
Rose shoved the Doctor into the TARDIS, fell in after him, tripped over his shoes, and landed on him in a rather undignified sprawl.
"Are we going to repopulate my species right this instant, then? If you give me a few minutes, the magic fairy dust will stop making me imagine you in a bunny suit and it'll probably be easier."
"We're not going to repopulate your species," she said, huffily. "Can you work the console?"
"Not without my suit."
"Doctor!" she yelped.
"What!" he yelped back.
"Work the console."
"No. I want my clothes." He turned that wide eyed pout on her, and it was all she could do not to just give up and snog him senseless. Must be some of the planet's atmosphere still in her head. ...Or his breathless voice next to her ear murmuring, "Take them off."
"I'm not wearing your clothes," she told him, though how she managed not to stammer was completely beyond her.
"Oh." He looked almost devastated. "Damn." He waggled his eyebrows suggestively and put a shaking hand up next to her face. "You'd look cute in my boxers."
Rose sighed. "Can't we just get out of here?"
"I need my trousers. It's getting a bit drafty in here and, besides, the TARDIS doesn't like nude people to fly her. She thinks there a party going on and she's missing it."
"You're not nude," she said, clenching her teeth to keep from throttling him. Or checking to see if...
"It's a hospital gown, Rose. What do they usually let you wear under hospital gowns?"
"Fine!" she said and rolled off of him, getting to her feet gingerly. "Go over there, sit down, and wait for me. Do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars, and do NOT leave without me."
"I'd never," he said. "Never ever. No place to stand and all that jazz."
"You're not going to remember any of this, tomorrow, are you?"
"No, why?" He got up and went to the jump seat where he sat down - on his hands, she noticed - and watched her expectantly.
"Good," she said, and all the exasperation she had experienced for the entire day finally caught up with her. "Because I could absolutely throttle you for bringing me here. Did you know the air is an aphrodesiac? When I ask you about it tomorrow, you'd better lie and tell me 'no'. Because I don't want to know what was going on in your fuzzy head, now or earlier, all right? We went to that restaurant and I wanted to throw you on the table. Not fair. I tried to get away from you - yeah, I admit it. And I ended up talking to someone every bit as insane as my mum about vibrators, which would help, but oh my god! And then it starts pouring and I got hit on by a creep that makes Jack look like the Virgin Mary and then you get dragged off like something off of Wild Kingdom. And I ended up covered in mud and had to bully some annoyingly stuck up old sod into selling me these clothes, so that's why I'm dressed like you, although I admit it was funny. And then, I found you, which took hours, so be glad I got here at all. Then I had to break in. I was going to tease you about it, and now I can't because they wanted to shove me in the box with you, which ruined my fun. And all you can say is 'Can we repopulate my species?' Tell you what, I'm doing all I can not to jump you right this minute. But you won't ask when you're sane, so let's just forget all about it. When people ask 'Have you ever been to Desteria?', we'll say 'Never heard of it.' OK?"
Then, before he could respond to any of that, she ran out the door and looked around expectantly.
"Hi," she said sheepishly.
"Doctor Tyler!" said Dr. Abbot, in shock.
"Yeah. Well, maybe. I'm his Rose, that's all."
"Oh," said the alien woman, looking quite distressed.
"Look, what you're doing here, it's brilliant, it really is. Please don't stop on our account. But the Doctor... he's not somebody to mess with. He isn't safe. He's blown more places up by accident than entire armies can do on purpose. He's good, don't look like that." She sighed at the woman looking at her in horror. "It's just, he's got a job to do, is all. No room for domestics or baby Time Lords or romantic interludes with random humans. He's the last of his kind, you were right, but the Universe doesn't let up just because he's on his own. Things break, all the time, and he's got to be there to fix them."
"But he must be terribly lonely."
"Usually," Rose said sadly.
"But he's got you," she added.
"Yes." Then, she grinned to push it all away. "But what he wants, if you can believe it, is his suit."
"In the cupboard," said Doctor Krishin, also looking distraught.
"It's ok," said Rose, walking over to get the suit out of the locked cupboard with a quick twitch of the screwdriver. Then, she nearly screamed in annoyance, because there was her bag, the swim bag she thought had been stolen. The Doctor had swapped it, too.
She sighed and turned to the aliens again. "Look, just, let's forget it. He's not going to remember, and if you write up that it was a catalog error or something and blame a computer, everything will be fine. I'll need that vial of his blood, too."
"The sample was used up in the analysis. We'll have to destroy the slides, just to cover it up," said Dr. Abbot.
Rose studied the woman carefully. Her face was innocent of any kind of guile or threat. "OK," she said. "I'm trusting you. But you'd better be sure, because he won't leave it lying around and if he finds out you've got it or someone bad has got it off you... well, let's just say you'll wish I'd let him blow the place up the first time." She looked from one to the other, compelling her eyes to match his for sincerity. "He doesn't believe in second chances, but I believe you mean no harm and he believes me. Please don't make me a liar, because if you do, I won't even try to stop him. I won't want to."
They looked nervously at her. "You have my word," Dr. Krishin said at last.
"And mine," added Dr. Abbot. She sighed. "It was nice to meet you, Dr. Tyler."
Rose grinned. "I can't tell you how relieved I was to find nice people with no running for our lives. Look, I'd best get going, before he sobers up and dies of embarrassment. Thanks for everything."
Dr. Abbot grinned. "Come see us. We have some suggestions you might want to try if your beauty and his faith aren't enough."
Rose blushed. Laughing, she waved them off, tumbled toward the TARDIS door, and returned to her home.
The Doctor was sitting exactly where she'd left him, and some sultry jazz was playing from the console. Rose shook her head and grimaced. "Your clothes," she said, and dropped them at his feet. "Can you work the console, now?"
"Yep!" he said, and bounced up to do just that. "Think so. Where do you want to go?"
"Somewhere without funny air, this time," she said.
He looked decidedly wired as they hit the Vortex. "That'll wait," he said. "We were going to repopulate my species. I distinctly remember you agreeing to that."
"So you're still out of it," she said.
"Yep," he agreed. "Stoned immaculate, to quote the expert. Don't worry. I'll sober up in a bit, I think. Now that I've got their little remote control gone."
He gestured at a small device lying on the console and she stared at it in distaste until she realized he'd moved into her personal space - her very personal space. He was pressed up against her, leaning over her shoulder and breathing cool, tantalizing air against her ear. She met his gaze to find his eyes nearly black and so breathtaking that she could hardly remember her name.
"You're still wearing my clothes," he whispered.
"No, I'm not," she squeaked, jumping toward the pile and nudging it with her foot. "They're right here."
"Oh," he said, sadly, considering his suit carefully. "Doesn't look so hot on the floor after all, does it?"
"Not really. Why don't you put them back on?"
"Good idea," he agreed. "Thanks."
He pulled his gown off over his head right there and Rose turned away quickly before she saw more than she wanted... more than... ok, before she saw exactly what she wanted but under entirely the wrong circumstances.
He whistled as he dressed, then apparently thought of something because he stopped and cleared his throat.
"Yes?" she said.
"Well, we're not going to get my species repopulated if I put all this back on."
"Did they brainwash you, too?" she demanded, determined to make him take her back so she could blow up the lab herself if they had.
"No. Don't think so. It just sounds like fun."
"Ask me again tomorrow," she said, resigned.
"Don't think I won't," he challenged.
She rolled her eyes. "Are you dressed yet?"
He sighed. "Yeah. You like?"
She turned around and smiled at him. "Yeah, you're beautiful."
"I know," he agreed, looking both cute from the drugs and smug from his usual attitude. "We match." He offered her a hand and wiggled it.
She took the offered hand. "Yeah, we do," she agreed. He pulled her into a spontaneous and slightly dizzy dance around the console.
It wasn't easy to dance with a drugged Doctor, but she gave it a go for awhile. She finally gave up when he spun away from her to argue with the TARDIS about why she had allowed penguins on board. Rose was absolutely certain the TARDIS was laughing hysterically at both of them, though she didn't know how she knew this.
She reclined on the sofa and watched the Doctor talk to the rabbits that didn't exist. But when he started trying to make up music to go with his poem, she'd had all she could take.
"Time for bed, Doctor," she said.
"Good," he said, caught her hand, and proceeded to half-lead, half-drag her toward the door.
She let him take her to her room, let him shed his coat and vest and dress shirt, as well as his trainers. She even dropped hers beside his. "Now, get in the bed and go to sleep," she said.
"Ok, if you want," he agreed. "But you have to answer one question first." He sat down on the bed and reached over to tug her with him.
"Yes?" she said breathlessly.
"What is this?" he asked, holding up a small package that he'd apparently unwrapped and opened.
She sighed and wished the floor would swallow her. Then, again, he'd already agreed that he wouldn't remember any of this, so whatever. She took the box, put the lid back on it and stuffed it into a drawer, trying to think of something witty to say. After everything, it seemed her brain had finally given up, though. "Nevermind," she said after a moment. "Just close your eyes and tomorrow it'll all be over."
"Even the desire to repopulate my species?" he asked, sounding quite innocent.
"Probably," she agreed and curled up next to him. "But if it isn't, be sure to let me know."
"Don't worry," he said, and somehow managed to fit a leg in between hers - thankfully only between her knees. Any higher and all her resolutions might have been blown to hell. "I'll tell you first." He closed his eyes and his breathing evened out. She watched him for a moment, then closed her own eyes.
"Tiny Rose Tylers," he mused. Then he giggled -actually giggled - and, wrapping his arms around her, dropped into the sleep of the heavily drugged.
Tiny Doctors, she thought, wistfully, and followed him into sleep.