The Doctor stepped out of the TARDIS with Rose in tow. He had a frown on his face as he closed the door behind her and turned to look at her.
"I'm still not happy about this. At all." He said sternly.
Rose rolled her eyes at him but otherwise ignored him, and started looking around. He had no reason to not be happy in comparison to her. She had only spoken to him about it a couple of times, and the recent events had left this as the only plausible option they could think of.
The first time they had spoken about it was in the kitchen. Rose had been sat drinking tea, whilst the Doctor was busy doing something technical to the toaster. (Rose had no idea why a toaster needed an upgrade, but she didn't bother questioning him.)
"Doctor?" She asked nervously.
"Mmm?" He replied with his sonic screwdriver in his mouth.
"I want to take the serum." She said, absent-mindedly blowing her tea.
He dropped everything and turned to her with an incredulous look on his face.
"I told you what can happen. You could die Rose." He said angrily.
"I know."
"Then why-"
"Doctor I want to keep my promise to you. I want to stay with you forever." She said, slowly moving towards him. Her heart shuddered audibly as his face softened at her words.
"Forever..." He breathed, turning so he was facing her directly.
"Forever." She said with finality. She closed the small gap between them and they embraced. He kissed the top of her head and sighed. She wished that they could stay like this forever-peaceful and happy, and with nobody else to ruin the perfection of the moment. Rose loved the fantastic adventures, the endless running and the explorations of splendiferous new worlds, but most of all, she loved the Doctor. She wished that she could tell him how she felt. She wished that she could think my Doctorrather than the Doctor.But she knew he would never feel the same.
"It would be perfect." She sighed.
"It would." He replied, much to her surprise.
He'd do this sometimes. He'd say things to her that made her think he might feel the same way, but then withdraw and be very distant for sometime, before they returned to the usual hand-holding, flirtatious pair they had grown to be.
"We could stay together for all of time. Travelling and exploring, seeing the wonders of the universe! Just let me take that serum Doctor, please!" She said imploringly, searching his eyes deperately, widening hers in that puppy-dog way that he almost always fell for.
His face looked torn, and inside she was screaming with excitement at the prospect of his conformation.
She was to be disappointed.
"No." He said,untangling himself from her arms and making his face void of expression.
He walked away, grabbing components from the toaster, then left the kitchen, leaving Rose stood there, looking longingly as his back turned round the corner and out of view.
She stuck her bottom lip out angrily and plonked herself on her chair with an exasperated huff. She'd get nowhere with him in the next day or so. She better let him cool off.
Within two days they had both gotten over their minor disagreement, and they were back to their normal selves. Rose had been trying to find a way to approach the subject, but had been struggling, not wanting to upset him any more. She had managed to push it to the back of her mind for now.
"Oh! And remember when that woman tried to paint you blue. She said-she said-you were too yellow!" They laughed hysterically, giddy from the adrenalin of their recent adventure.
"She wanted to paint you green!" Rose bellowed, and they continued to laugh until their bellies hurt, and they wiped their eyes and leaned back onto the chair, smiling contently. "I'm going to go and get into my pyjamas. Back in a sec."
She skipped off to her room, happy, and with thoughts of her accelerated ageing tucked safely away where she couldn't dwell on it, she was content to just spend some feud-free time with the Doctor.
She floated into her room and started to brush her hair, humming to herself.
Taken by surprise, she clumsily dropped her brush on her toe (it still hadn't recovered from the latest injury she had received when she kicked the bed in rage) and gasped aloud. She stepped towards the mirror cautiously, like it was a feral animal about to snap at her at any moment, and leaned her head forward slightly, examining it in silent trepidation.
Just this morning she had been thinking that she must go back to earth and go to a human hairdressers. Her brown roots were showing way too much, and she needed a trim. But now, as she examined her scalp, a chill of panic ran through her body.
Her roots were grey.
She ran her fingers through her hair desperately, secretly praying that it was just her over-active imagination. But the grey did not transform back to brown, and her insides turned to lead as she thought about how quickly she was ageing.
How quickly she was dying.
"Doctor!" She screeched automatically, chocking on the lump in her throat, holding back terrified tears.
She heard hurried footsteps and the door swung open, he flew in, with a panic-stricken look on his face.
"What is it? What happened?" He urged.
All Rose could manage was a small whimper, before tears began streaming down her face. The Doctor's eyes were drawn to her hair, and his mouth dropped open in shock as he focused.
"How is that-when?-but you were just-" He croaked.
A sob broke free from Rose which she tried her hardest to subdue. The Doctor automatically held the sides of her face and leaned his forehead against hers.
"I'm dying." She whispered.
"No. No, you're not." The Doctor said, quiet but sure and determined. "We're getting the serum." He breathed.
And then he did something she did not expect.
He moved a hand into her hair and cradled her head, before closing his eyes and slowly moving his lips to hers. At first Rose's mind was even more panicked and confused than it had been, and she considered pulling away. But then a flood of feelings came crashing down on her, and she closed her eyes and wrapped and arm around the back of his neck to pull him closer.
It lasted just a few seconds, but Rose felt her whole existence shift as he confirmed, with a simple kiss, that he felt the same way. He pulled back and looked into her eyes, and she felt like he could see every fibre of her being. Blushing, she smiled nervously, suddenly worried that the Doctor regretted his sudden actions. She noticed his gaze shift from her eyes, to explore the rest of her face. He didn't look upon her with a happy expression, and it seemed he wasn't telling her something.
He opened the door silently and left. She sighed. A minute later Rose heard the whirring of the TARDIS, suggesting that he had set the controls to take them, hopefully, to get the serum.
She turned round to scrutinize her roots again, but what she saw instead made her head spin and her only explanation was that she was dreaming. (A part of her mind pointed out that, if she was dreaming, she would have dreamt the kiss too.)
The face of the woman she saw in the mirror reflected her terror, but surely it wasn't her? How could that have happened in the past five minutes?
The woman in the mirror wore faint-but definitely real, and definitely growing-wrinkles.
The panic took over, and her vision became blurred, then darker, and then everything went black.