"Aww!!" The Doctor complained as he picked his way through the charred remains of the once-great library. "...and I'd so wanted you to see it, Rose." He bent down to pick up a blackened book, only to have it crumble to dust in his hand as he stood. He opened his hand and watched the breeze carry off the ashes. "Too bad. It was magnificent too..." he trailed off as his mind began to wander.

Behind him Rose was poking around in the ruins. Trying to find something that might have survived. Anything. "Doctor?" she shouted. "What exactly are we looking for?"

He was thinking, his eyes distant. At the sound of his name, though, he blinked and was back. "Huh?" he muttered and turned his upperhalf to look at her and repeated himself a bit more loudly. "Huh?"

Rose thought he might not have understood so she tried to clarify. "I mean, what did you want to come here for anyways?" She looked down as she tried to navigate through all the not-quite-burnt bits to get closer to the Doctor. She absently noted that her white shoes, almost identical to his, only newer, were going to be gray by the time she got home. "It's just a library, right? I mean, can't you just get another copy of... whatever it was you wanted?" She stopped a few feet from him.

"No! 'Course not!" The Doctor turned to look at her, wearing his 'You-can't-possibly-have-just-said-such-a-daft-thing-as-that-Rose-Tyler' look. "This was THE Library of Alexandria! The most complete, lengthy, and, by far, the LARGEST collection of writings in the entire world!! ...at the time, anyway. It's FAMOUS!!" He had started pacing and when he said that last bit he'd stopped and stretched his arms out like he was playing airplane. "THIS. IS. SPARTA!" the Doctor shouted loudly, his face to the heavens.

Rose looked at him.

His head suddenly returned to a more normal angle and a huge grin practically split his face in two. "...always wanted to say that."

Rose grinned at him and giggled at his silliness. "So... what exactly did you want to see?" she asked him.

"Oh, nothing." He ambled around with his hands shoved into his coat pockets. "Just wanted to get something I'd left."

She hated it when he was cryptic like that. She figured he knew that too. Probably why he did it so much. She gave him an 'answer-me-properly-or-else' look and asked, "What was it?"

She couldswer he was acting a bit nervous. "Oh... nothing. Just..." he avoided looking at her like he was afraid of being scolded. "...just a record of Time Lord history... nothing, really..." He kicked at a bit of something and tried to look innocent. Something he only did when he'd done something he knew was bad. He hoped Rose hadn't figured that out.

She had. "But... doesn't that mean that-"

He cut her off. "Yup! It means I left important information that nobody on earth is ever supposed to know, lying about in a library where anybody who wanted to could read it." he said quickly. Far too quickly.

It took his companion a minute to process his faster-than-light confession. "So... I take it that's bad." It wasn't a question.

"Yup." He popped the 'p' for effect.

"And that means... you've altered history?"

"Yup." he popped the 'p' again.

""Gave mankind way more than it was ready for" and all that jazz?"

"Yup." Another pop.

"So you may have screwed the entire universe by leaving that behind?"

"Yyyup." Again with the pop.

"...you like making that sound when you say 'yup' don't you?"

He gave her a look that said 'Do you really need to ask?' and smiled. "...Yup!" But he'd done it again anyways.

She liked that about him. Even when threatened with the possible end of the universe because of a silly mistake, something all his fault, he still acted as though it was all a big cosmic joke. "So why don't you seem the least bit worried?"

He grinned at her. That's why he kept her around, Rose Tyler, she was quick. "Besidesthe fact that it's probably ash now, I don't think, even in a billion years, that you humans could even begin to understand the complexities of the Time Lord society!"

Aha. "It's in Gallifreyan, isn't it." she asked him. She knew the answer before she'd asked though. Her reward was a crafty grin almost as large as eternity. "Y'know, if you keep smiling like that all the time, your face will split in two." she commented casually as they picked their way out of the burned remains and towards the Tardis.

"Naah."

"Yes you will! Your face will split in half and you'll hafta regenerate again!"

He glanced at her from the corner of his eye. "Why, Rose Tyler, I didn't know you were so worried about me!" he joked. The soreness of the regeneration subject had long since been dealt with.

"No, it's just that, I finally get used to you looking like that, and you go around carelessly smiling something that the Face of Boe would be jealous of? You trying for a record or something? 'Most Interesting Ways For A Time Lord To Regenerate'?" She whacked his shoulder and faked being cross with him.

They reached the Tardis and as he unlocked it he pretended to think about the idea. "'Most Interesting Ways For A Time Lord To Regenerate' huh? Sounds like fun!" They got in and he started to look at the controls as if pondering where to go next.

"Home."

He looked up suddenly. "What?"

"Home." she restated. "I want to go home."

"Why?"

"...my clothes stink. All of 'em. Dirty. Let's go."

He was silent for a moment. "...okay." and he proceeded to do his Dance of the Time Lords. Rose had taken to making up names for his odd habits. She particularly liked coming up with names for when he ran aroundthe controls, whacking stuff, and smiling like an assylum escapee. The thought of him in a straightjacket crossed her mind. It wouldn't have been so bad if the jacket hadn't looked like his normal suitcoat with extra-long sleeves.

As the ship arrived, the Doctor was nearly scared out of said suitcoat when Rose, who hehad ended up right next to, burst out into a fit of seemingly random laughter, and fell over onto the floor.

"Oi! What's so funny, then?"

She couldn't answer him through her laughing, but she pointedat him as if that explained it.

"Huh?" He looked down at himself. "What?"

More laughter and some unintelligable almost-words.

"Hey, what are you laughing at, anyway?" he asked a bit irked, but not at anything or anyone in particular.

She just laughed away at him.

He got a stroke of genius and reached into his coat to pull out the psychic paper. "Hold this?"

She looked at him and took it, but didn't stop laughing. She was actually starting to cry from laughing so much.

"What's so funny?" he asked her way-too-sweetly. After a few seconds more of being laughed at he took it back and looked at it. And looked some more. He pulled out his glasses and kept on looking at it. He returned it to the safety of his pocket and did the same with hisspecs. "Oh." he said.

He then proceeded to fall to the floor laughing just like she had.

=-=-=

A/N: Sorry! Sorry about the Sparta joke! When I thought up that scene it was popular! Andnow I just can't see that being taken out!! X3

And I'd love to see someone draw the "Doctor in a Straightjacket" scene!! XD plzplzplz!!