Shared Cathartic Understandings

They share out tea and toast-marmalade for the Doctor and fig preserves for Rose. They laugh and joke their way through breakfast. This too could become a habit, and they both secretly hope it will. Once the kitchen is set back to rights, they each set off to ready themselves for the day. The Doctor pointing out that it will likely be another long one, so dress comfortably.

Rose finds this intensely amusing as she's getting dressed in sweatpants, a t-shirt, and a hoodie, knowing that the Doctor will be 'dressed comfortably' in his suit.

/Silly alien!/ she thinks her favourite endearment to herself. Stopping mid-stride, Rose rocks back on her heals a moment.

/He's not alien anymore...we're alien...or not really...we're normal and everyone else is alien! Even my mum!/ Rose thinks with sudden and hearts-breaking insight.

Rose needs to sit down a moment at that thought. She hasn't considered this. Well, she has; she knows she needs to start thinking of herself as a Time Lord, but she just hasn't really -grocked it till now. Her mother had told her she would change, that she would become alien, something different, something that even her mum wouldn't recognize. And here she is, apparently back from the dead, back from dying, and 100% alien. She's so happy to be here, but...

Finally reaching a turning point in her understanding that she just hasn't had time for yet, Rose bursts into tears. Throwing herself on her bed, she huddles around one of her pillows, thoughts of what she has warring with those of what she's lost.

The Doctor is waiting in the Library for what he's decided is too long. Setting off in search of Rose, he steps out of the Library and over to her door. Pushing through without thinking, he finds Rose sobbing into her pillow, trying to be quiet. He doesn't know why she's upset...and then again, maybe he can guess. He can tell she didn't intend him to hear her. Striding directly to her bed, the Doctor scoops Rose up and sits back down with her in his lap. Rubbing her back and rocking soothingly, he just holds her through her catharsis. Eventually the large gulping sobs subside, and the weeping slows. Rose realises that she's hanging on to the Doctor as if her life depends on it, face pressed into his shoulder and fists clinched in his coat. Noticing that his shoulder is wet with her tears...and more, Rose is now feeling self-conscious. Feeling her tense up, the Doctor isn't going to give her the chance to be embarrassed.

"Hang on a second," he says, depositing Rose back onto her bed. Getting up, he goes and retrieves a warm wet flannel from the bathroom and a couple of dry ones. Handing these to her, he squeezes her hand, and leaves the room. Grateful for the moment to compose herself; Rose gets cleaned up. Stepping out of the bathroom in a clean shirt and fresher, though still red around the edges, she sees the Doctor leaning against her door also in a fresh shirt but no coat this time. Still not saying anything he holds his hand out for her. Rose looks at his hand a moment, but walks over and slips hers in it. With a comforting smile the Doctor leads her out of the room.

He turns and guides them down a couple of hallways she's never paid any attention to before. They have passed several more junctions, and many, many doors. Rose isn't sure why the Doctor wants this to appear very far away, but she thinks it's just to be impressive. Finally they arrive at a door with an intricate patten inlayed on its surface in what looks like mother of pearl. It's a series of lines and circles in a zig-zag sort of layout. Looking over at the Doctor, Rose sees he has a cat and canary grin on his face.

"You think you're so impressive," Rose teases, smirking at him.

"I am so impressive, Rose Tyler!" Not to be outdone, he steps to the side and opens the door with a flourish. "After you, my Lady."

Rose would have had a sassy reply, but she forgot it upon stepping into the space beyond the doorway. Leaving the Doctor behind, she walks forward so overwhelmed that she can hardly form thoughts to start cataloguing what she's seeing. Walking a few dozen yards she stops to take it all in. The TARDIS is singing to her, augmenting the memory she's standing in with more of the depth that it would have held...if she could have ever stood here...Gallifrey.

She knows it instantly. The oddly orange sky that lightens to peach directly above where some high wispy clouds are chasing each other across the face of a moon. The huge orange sun, and the smaller brighter one just touching the horizon. To her right is the edge of a grove of dark trunked trees with silver leaves that shimmer and rustle in the breeze sounding like the hum of a million cicadas. Standing at the apex of a hill that slopes away below her, the same breeze that lifts her hair and sussurates through the trees, causes the tall vermillion grass around her to sway and undulate like a vast red ocean. Following the slope of the hills to her left, she can see far in the distance the edge of what might be a sea or ocean, and a range of sharp forbidding mountains, dark sided and shining copper topped as the sun flashes the snow metallic.

A much more subdued Doctor comes up beside Rose, looking off toward the mountains. She is unwilling to break the silence. Taking his hand, they stand like that, both enraptured in the beauty of the memory.

"I haven't been here since before the War began." The Doctor muses, breaking the silence. "I couldn't...I wasn't strong enough."

"It's even more beautiful than I made it in my head from that one time you described it to me, after Utah," she whispers, still engrossed in memorizing the scene.

"Here, let me show you something," the Doctor says with a gleam of excitement in his eyes. Taking Rose's hand he escorts her into the woods. They walk for a few minutes and come to a small glen. There are stone benches around the edge of a patio where they take a seat, and in the center of the space is a fountain unlike anything Rose has ever seen. It's tall, but constantly in motion. Made up of clear glass-like spheres that slide around and through each other as the water slides around and through them. Rose finds she can't watch it for long without getting dizzy. She almost understands what she sees, but that understanding is just out of reach. What really has her rooted to the spot is the music. She would be completely unable to describe how ethereal and alien and beautiful it is. It is like ice and rain, wind through crystals, and the disorienting hollow music from Ben Franklin's armonica she'd once seen in a documentary. It sounds a great deal like the TARDIS herself.

"Sounds like TARDIS singing." Rose blurts out, when she can find speech again.

"Yes it does," says the Doctor with a chuckle. "I had the TARDIS build it for me from my memory of the one that was in my mother's garden. The music changes with the quality of light as well. It sounds completely different in full sun, than it does now, in shade."

"But how does it do...what it's doing...the moving through...itself?" Even trying to say it is confusing.

"Time Lord technology mixed with art. It is subtly dimensionally transcendental, like the TARDIS. Each sphere inhabits the same space and no space at all, at the same time. They are in perpetual motion. The water is in and around all the spheres all the time. Its name in Gallifreyan means- The Song of the Spheres. They were a very rare piece of conceptual art. My mother was very zen about it, saying that the answers to all the Universe's questions could be answered by listening to the music in the Spheres. I showed her the math that made it possible when I was 10, but she told me I wasn't asking the right questions." He smiles softly at the memory.

"Thank you. For this. For sharing this piece of your home with me." Rose is abruptly struck by what he has given her. He is about to respond when she stops him, placing her fingertips against his lips.

Dropping her hand and her gaze back to her lap, she explains why he had found her in such a state earlier, "I...I'm afraid to sound silly...you found me grieving the loss of my...well, my human-ness. I was teasing you in my head earlier, called you a silly alien." Rose smiles at him apologetically. He waves the apology aside with a smile. "Then I realized that I'm alien now. Then, I thought, no, now we're normal, and everyone else is the alien...including my mum!" she gasps. Taking a couple of steadying breaths, she continues. "You know, she once told me I would change. That I'd become alien, and she wouldn't be able to recognize me. At the time, she scared me, but it wasn't going to stop me from staying with you. And now here I am 100% alien to everyone... everyone but you." Finally looking up and into his sympathetic gaze, "And how many years Doctor did you live as the only one of your kind? Do you remember when we were on Platform One, and I asked you where you were from? You didn't want to answer me. You hated the answer; hated yourself. Then you named yourself. Thinking of all this," she says with an encompassing sweep of her arm. Taking both his hands in hers and with slow tears tracking her cheeks, she continues with determination... ""I'm a Time Lord. I'm the last of them. They're all gone. I'm the only survivor. I'm left traveling on my own because there's no-one else." My reply to you then and now, is still, "There's me." You are not alone, now or ever!" she states with a finality she's only now begun to truly feel.

The Doctor is thoroughly speechless. Every superior Time Lord sense he has is locked on one Rose Tyler, fresh Time Lady, and the woman he is utterly and completely besotted with. Before his brain can kick in and stop him, he leans forward and kisses Rose square on the lips. It takes her exactly 2.26 seconds, just long enough for her eyes to flutter shut, and her brain to tell her to respond, and respond she does!

Sighing, she relaxes into him and answers in kind. It doesn't take more than a few more seconds for them to start exploring one another, deepening the kiss. Thankful now for the miracle of respiratory bypass, Rose releases the Doctor's hands intending to bury hers in his hair. Instead instinctually she moves them toward his face, and before either of them notice, Rose's fingertips brush his temples. Without warning Rose slides into the surface of the Doctor's mind. Initially, she nearly drowns in his emotional tide before she learns how to breathe them in without taking them on. She allows his emotions to pass over and through her, but not rest. This way she can observe them, without being crushed by the waves of feeling. Oh, are there feelings, and presently they're all focused on her. Respect, admiration, appreciation, devotion, desire, and love, not the words, but the intensity of all the concepts together as a whole and individually.

One moment she's alone and the next, the Doctor is with her. It takes him a moment to realize she's not frantic and he doesn't have to shield, or save her. He had expected to find her undone, overwhelmed. He had frozen the moment he felt her enter his mind, terrified for her, but here she is shining and...What? What is she doing?...

Either Rose knew instinctively what to do, or perhaps Darling gave her the notion, but outside their minds Rose splits her attention. Taking one of her hands away from the Doctor's face she grasps one of his hands and brings it to her own temple. In a burst of golden light they are now in a place that is neither his nor hers. It is theirs and they've created it.

-Rose! How'd you do that?- The Doctor is just a little afraid, but mostly awed. She knows.

-I don't know. It just felt right.- He sees why she felt that way.

-This wasn't how I expected your lesson on telepathy to go.-

-Me, either. Where are we?-

-We are in a shared interactive telepathic space.-

-Wow, that sounds dry and boring.-

-Boring, eh?-

Taking it as a challenge, the Doctor kisses Rose properly again and this time they're flooded by the shared sensations from both their perspectives. This is a long and thorough kiss made more intense by the emotions accompanying it. The Doctor can't figure out why he ever previously thought snogging the daylights out of Rose Tyler was a bad idea. Idiot!

-Okay, I take it back, not boring!- Rose exclaims and she can feel his mental satisfied smirk.

Exchanging a soft orange mental hug they pull themselves out of the warm golden limbo they'd created.

Coming back to themselves, hands on faces and foreheads together, they grin into each others eyes. They enjoy one more comforting kiss, which is chaste in comparison. Pulling back from the Doctor, but still holding his hand, Rose now senses a tangible connection to the man next to her; a more in depth tingle than was there before. Focusing on it, she can just pick up on his emotions.

Feeling what Rose has noticed, the Doctor lightly caresses the link they have just established. He's pleased to sense her surface emotions are bright and happy, tinged with the orange of contentment, and shades of ...What?

He can almost see their emotions as colors now, overlaying his own perceptions. Well, that will take some getting used to. The Doctor wonders what else he might inherit from his Rose.

"Doctor?" Rose looks over questioningly. "Is this you? It's different from the hum." She sort of reaches in and pokes their fresh link. Both of them wince, and laugh at their expressions.

"Yup! That, Rose Tyler is a direct telepathic link. You're stuck with me, now." He says, grinning cheekily.

"Oh! Is it like what you had with your people, or did we just get married, or something?" She asks this kidding, but seeing his face fall, hurts her hearts. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to remind you...not here...I wasn't thinking. Not very...respectful of me. I guess, I'm not making a very good Time Lady," she finishes, feeling like she's ruined the mood by being so rude.

"No, no, Rose. It's okay. You don't have to apologize for making me remember, and you Lady Rose Tyler, are the best Time Lady there is," he says smilingly, attempting to save the mood. He isn't ready for her to know that this is in fact the initial step toward a full "marriage". Neither of them is ready for that, but he hadn't expected her to link them accidentally-always an adventure with his Rose.

Smiling sadly, and squeezing his hand, she appreciates what he's saying. She's well aware, as they both are, that she is the only Time Lady. Turning toward him again, Rose reaches out grasping his tie and pulls him towards her. Smiling teasingly, she kisses them both happy again. Rose completely forgets about her question in her blissful exploration of their new level of intimacy.

They finally break apart, but stay seated on the bench wrapped or rapt in each other; it's hard to say. The fountain sings to them of a place no longer in this Universe, but certainly not forgotten, and now known by one more. Standing finally, the Doctor helps Rose to her feet and they move away from the sanctuary, back through the trees, and in the direction they'd entered from.

"It's hard to imagine we're still in the TARDIS. This feels so real. Like I should be able to walk a thousand miles that way, and reach the water," Rose muses. Pausing, she notices that the air has scent now, and she thinks she can almost hear bird song in the distance.

"I know," the Doctor agrees. "This specific place didn't actually exist. I made it from memories of several of my favorite spots on Gallifrey." Turning, he begins pointing out the various locations to Rose. "My best friend Koschei and I would roll down this hill when we were little. That grove of trees was near my teacher K'anpo's house in the mountains. You could see those, the Mountains of Solace, and that piece of The Ocean of Bal Soon from the very top of the Tower in the Citadel. And as I showed you, my mother's fountain in her garden behind our House. Having a created space gave me glimpses of my safest places and better times, but now it's all I have. A construct of stolen happy moments, from somewhere that no longer exists."

Coming to a complete stop, Rose tugs at the Doctor, bringing him back to her.

"Doctor, they aren't stolen if they're happy, and here in this situation, Gallifrey does exist," she says insistently eyes shining. "You said the TARDIS can see all of Time and Space. That means that part of her knows exactly what each of these places looks like, because at one Time they did, and in that Time they still do. This may be a copy, but it's a copy that remembers being the original. In a way, it's better, because it's made of your happiest places. Just think Doctor, in a way there's a Time where you and Koschei are rolling down -that- hill, right now, giggling like little boys without a care in the world." Looking off down, the hill she can almost imagine their laughter.

With a look of complete and utter wonder painted across his face, the Doctor can only reflect again, what he ever did without her.

"Rose Tyler, you're amazing. How do you always know exactly what to say?"

"I don't know. I just say what I feel, when I feel like I need to say it!" She says with a grin and a laugh. "The trick is actually getting you to listen."

"Oi! Rose Tyler, I always listen. I don't always pay attention. There's a distinct difference." He says cheekily.

"Oh like the difference between being a git and a prat?" She says with a giggle.

"Oi!"

Making their way to the hallway and closing the door after them. Rose turns placing her palm on the pattern inlayed in the wood.

"Will I be able to come to this room again?" She asks hopefully.

"Of course, any time you want. She'll share it with you now. It was daft of me to keep it hidden," he says rubbing the back of his neck.

"Yes. Daft of you to keep things hidden. You should stop that," she teases him with tongue caught in her mischievous grin.

"Oh, I see what you did there. Cheeky Rose Tyler, cheeky, indeed," he laughs at her.

"Let's go make some tea, I need a snack at least before we actually get any work done today, and it's been 4 hours, 36 minutes, and 12 whole seconds since breakfast."

She's about to bound off for the kitchen when the Doctor pulls her into a fierce embrace and kisses them both breathless again.

"Thank you," he whispers, touching his forehead to hers.

Those two words contain the Universe. Taking the each other's hands they do what they're best at and run.

A/N: Thank you so much for all the new follows and comments. You guys are awesome! So glad you're liking the story. I hope you liked my Gallifrey Room. Don't we all want one!? :-) Thanks to Ashleigh, my favorite Beta in the multiverse.!