They were running.
"Bit of a work out," she shouted, and the Doctor laughed loudly, grabbing her hand and pulling her along even faster.
She could feel the gravel moving underneath her feet as her heart thumped madly against her ribcage. She couldn't help grinning along with him, even as her lungs struggled to fill against their mad rush.
CRACK.
She let out a yelp of pain and buckled over onto the ground.
"Rose!"
"It's fine – I'm okay. It's just my ankle, nothing serious."
"Can you walk?"
"I think so – argh!"
"No you can't. I'll carry you – come on!"
Rose breathed in so quickly it sent a dizzy rush of air to her head.
She opened her eyes, and looked around, trying to see past her light-headedness.
The Doctor wasn't carrying her. And she wasn't in the TARDIS. It looked like… some sort of base. She didn't recognise it at all.
What had happened? This couldn't be good. She closed her eyes for a second, and then opened them again. First priority – find out where the hell she she could find out what happened before.
She sat up, and let out a loud involuntary yelp, shocked by the pain that ran through her body at the movement. She heard someone's footsteps running towards her, probably having heard the noise, but she couldn't focus enough to think of some sort of plan. She could just pretend to be asleep, couldn't she?
Slowly, she tried to move back into her first position, but that didn't stop the horrible sensation. She was breathing too quickly, panicking more than she knew was sensible. She tried taking slow, deep breaths, tried to calm herself, but wave after wave of pain kept crashing over her. She didn't realise she had closed her eyes until she heard someone saying her name.
"Rose, I'm here. Just breathe deep for me, okay. Your drugs have worn off, but Owen is going to give you a shot, alright? Just hold on."
She opened her eyes to see a woman looking back at her.
"Who are you?" she said, between breaths. "Where I am?"
"My name is Tosh – remember? I was here when you woke up the first time."
Rose shook her head. "I've never seen you before," she said, pushing the woman's hand off her. "Where's the Doctor? Where am I?"
"Rose!" the Doctor ran into the room, as if he'd heard her question.
"Doctor!" Rose cried out (with a little more emotion than she might have liked), reaching for his hand.
"Ouch," he said through his teeth, as she squeezed down on it hard.
"Where the hell are we?" she said, slightly aggressively, closing her eyes again.
"With friends," the Doctor said. "Just focus on my voice, can you do that?"
Rose nodded.
"Owen, hurry up!" Tosh called.
"I'm coming, I'm coming!" a man's voice came towards them.
"Let me do it," she heard the Doctor say, and then: "I'm going to give you an injection, okay?"
Rose nodded again.
"Alright, here you go."
There was a sharp pain in her arm, and then a deep, cooling sensation running all over her. She breathed a deep sigh of relief. The pain wasn't gone, but it was nowhere near where it had been before.
"Thanks," she said, opening her eyes. She looked at the Doctor. "You all right?" she asked him, half laughing.
He smiled at her. "Much better now," he said. "Top banana.""
They looked at each other for a moment, and the man behind the Doctor cleared his throat.
"I don't mean to interrupt," he said, smirking, "but I'd like to examine my patient… now she's a little more coherent."
"You're a doctor?" Rose asked. She wanted to ask the Doctor what had happened, but she wasn't sure if had avoided explaining right away on purpose, so she held down her curiosity until they were alone.
"I wondered if you'd remember," Owen said, almost to himself, before holding out his hand. "Owen Harper," he said.
"Rose Tyler," she said back.
"I know," he laughed. "We met about an hour ago. The medication we put you on can sometimes cause short-term memory loss. Which is a shame, really, because you and Tosh - "
Tosh elbowed Owen in the knee, before reintroducing herself to Rose.
"Is it just the two of you here?"
"Gwen, Ianto and - well, they're here as well – don't know where they've got to, though," Owen said. "But you'll see them soon enough. Right now your check up is more important."
Owen, with the Doctor's (probably unneeded) assistance, pulled Rose gently onto her feet, and helped her downstairs into the autopsy room.
"Welcome to my office," Owen said, as the Doctor helped her to sit on the metal table in the middle of the room. Rose had a distinct feeling that there had been more done here than checkups.
"Cozy," she said.
"I need you to take your jacket off for me – is that alright?" Owen said.
"Uh, yeah," Rose said, with what she hoped was a subtle glance at the Doctor. Owen followed her gaze, and cleared his throat. The other man failed to get the message, not moving.
"Doctor," Rose said.
"Mhm?"
"Leave?"
"Oh! Right, yes, sorry! I'll just, uh, I'll just be upstairs. If you need anything."
"I'm sure we'll manage," Owen said.
The Doctor looked back at Rose, apparently double-checking she wanted him to go.
"I'll see you later, yeah?"
He gave an odd nod and a tight smile, and then finally left the room.
"Took his time," Owen said, as Rose undid her jacket.
She breathed in sharply as she saw the dark bruising on her chest.
"It's looking a lot better," Owen told her, pressing lightly against her ribs.
"It was worse than this?" she said, feeling a little sick.
"How's that?" he asked her.
"Sore," she replied, making herself look away.
"On a scale of one to ten?"
"Seven… That's eight."
"Okay. I'm going to have a look at your back now, give me a number again."
"Six."
"Good. That's really good. Raise your arm for me?"
Rose winced.
"That hurt?"
"Yeah," she said, scrunching her nose up.
"You can put it down now… I'm just going to do a quick scan and compare your vitals to how they were when you came in."
He walked over to the tray lying by the side of the room, and picked up an odd looking, rectangular device with a small green screen.
"That's alien," Rose said, looking at it curiously.
"Yep. Fell through the rift about a month ago. Bloody useful, I've got to say. Not sure where it came from though."
"The rift… Are we in Cardiff?"
"That's right," he said, running the alien device over her. "Been here before, then?"
"Not for a while."
"Have any rift trouble?"
"You could say that," Rose said, remembering what was meant to be a quick refuelling trip. Just a quick pit stop, and then back on the road: 'into time, and space!' She remembered hi-fiving Jack and smiling to herself.
"Something funny?" Owen said.
"Just remembering a friend of mine," she said.
"Friend from Cardiff?"
"Not quite," she smiled.
Owen looked at her curiously as he finished her scan, then frowned. He shook his head.
"What?" Rose asked. "Good or bad?"
The man looked at her.
"Well, the good news," Owen said, looking down at the screen again, "is that you're not going to die."
Rose raised her eyebrows and laughed. "Brilliant, thanks," she said.
"The bad news," he continued, "is that you really should have."
"Lucky escape then," Rose said, not feeling as bothered by that as someone who didn't travel with the Doctor might have.
"Bit more than that, actually…" Owen said, looking at the screen. He walked over and showed it to her.
"Look there," he said, pointing at the image – a black and white photo of what appeared to be her heart.
Rose looked down at the screen, and frowned. "What's that?" she said, pointing to a dark patch on the side.
"That," Owen said, "is a bruise. And not a nice one. I couldn't see how bad it was when we fixed you up before, but looking at it now… I don't mean to be blunt, but it's a wonder you're still here."
Rose put her hand on her chest. "Can you fix it?" she said.
"I don't need to," Owen said. "That's the weird bit. It seems to be getting better by itself."
Rose frowned at him, biting her lip.
"Do you remember what happened?" he watched her closely.
Rose didn't say anything.
"If I was you," Owen said, leaning in, "I would go find out."
Rose looked at him for a moment, and then leapt off the slab, ignoring the sharp pain it caused, and half-ran to find the Doctor.