keep_counting | Fic: Strange Things (Doctor Who)

Title: Strange Things
Characters/Pairings: Nine/Rose
Rating: R
Warnings: Angst, sex, not beta'ed so probably filled with mistakes.
Genre: Angst/Hurt-Comfort/Fluff/Romance/Fluff (in that order exactly)
Word-count: 4,259
Disclaimer: I don't own anything in relation to this.
Summary: She was going to die. All because of some little stupid bug. She was going to die and there wasn't anything he could do about it.

“It’s a strange thing, how you can love somebody, how you can be all eaten up inside with needing them – and they simply don’t need you. That’s all there is to it, and neither of you can do anything about it.
And they’ll be the same way with someone else, and someone else will be the same way about you and it goes on and on – this desperate need – and only once in a rare million do the same two people need each other.”

-Madeleine L’Engle

Her throat and mouth felt like a desert and the light was too bright. She could feel it, glaring in through her closed eyelids like sharp shards of glass. It made the pounding headache worse, it made her groan and her throat stung and scratched as she did so. She coughed, eyes flying open as spasms raked through her body. Despite her muscles protests, she managed to sit up, only barely aware that someone was supporting her, an arm around her shoulders, holding her up and holding a white towel to her mouth.

White with red on it. Huh.

Wasn’t coughing up blood pretty bad?

”Rose? Rose, can you hear me?”

She wanted to answer, but she was still coughing, dry sobs now, no more blood, but there was enough of the vile liquid to coat the inside of her mouth, to stain her teeth light pink and mark the taste of metal on her tongue. It made her feel sick, made her stomach roll and she was retching now, very much aware that there wasn’t anything to throw up at all.

”Sssshhh,” someone was saying again, and there was something damp and cool on her forehead and she was being pushed gently back on the bed. She wanted to answer. Wanted to say thank-you. She knew that voice.

She managed to focus and it wasn’t until she saw him that she remembered him and remembered what she was doing, why she was sitting here, in the infirmary with barely enough strength to throw up.

Knew why the Doctor was looking so worried. She didn’t like that look on him. All frown-y and his eyes more grey than blue. She didn’t like that at all.

“I’ll be fine,” she said, trying for an encouraging smile, but that only made him frown harder, which in turn made her frown as well.

“’Course,” he said, and it wasn’t said with conviction and a manic smile. He just looked worried and a little bit broken.

Rose clenched her eyes shut, trying to block out the light. “Doctor…”

The lights went lower almost before she’d gotten the word out, helping only slightly but helping nonetheless. She wondered if he had done it or if his sentient ship had done it. The TARDIS seemed to like her most of the time, was willing to take care of her and this time…

This time it was pretty bad.

“Go to sleep, Rose.” The Doctor muttered, and she felt a faint sting in her arm before she drifted away again.

oOo

She was going to die.

It sat like a heavy lump in the Doctor’s throat, the knowledge. It was surreal, everything he did, checking her over, holding her as she trashed, wiping her forehead. Like watching a movie of someone else, knowing that it was sad, but being happily blessed that it wasn’t happening to you. Only, it was happening to him. To her.

She was going to die.

And not because of Slitheen or Daleks or Gelth or a mad piece of skin. Not because of plastic-men or anything else.

Because of one, bright and green little insect on a planet that was normally oh so safe.

A planet that he’d never had any problems on before.

The bite was only dangerous to humans after all.

She’d joked about it at first, as she’d discovered the small punctures on her wrist. They’d gone back to the TARDIS and she’d been scratching and he’d asked her in annoyed tones to stop, because that honestly wasn’t healthy, and she’d gasped when she’d seen it and then joked about getting super-powers of some kind. She’d even protested when he had insisted on looking at it, stating that it was nothing, but threats of horns suddenly sprouting from her heads and eggs being planted under her skin had persuaded her to come to the medic bay.

Nothing had appeared wrong. He’d put some balm on the bite and let her go, off to bed, sleeping all her time away.

All her time.

“I’ll be fine.”

Dying, and still trying to reassure him.

Sometimes, he felt like he was two inches tall beside her, humbled and marvelling at a little human girl affecting him this much.

He reached out a hand, running it over the bandage and further up her arm, trying to ignore how feverish her skin felt. She was always so warm, but this was almost scalding and it was unnatural and not safe. And he’d promised to keep her safe.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered, thinking of how the TARDIS had alerted him as he’d been sitting in the library, how he’d thought it was the ship malfunctioning until he heard the screams from her room and found her sitting, staring into nothing and seeing something horrible enough to make her white as a sheet.

She’d been in this state for almost a day now. She looked so small on the infirmary-bed, so vulnerable and he could hardly bear it, would hardly touch her for fear she would break completely under his hands.

There wasn’t a cure. The poison from the bite was methodically destroying her systems one by one, shutting down organs slowly, drawing it out as if to test her, see how much she could take before she went completely.

“I’ll be fine.”

She was going to die. And there wasn’t anything he could do about it.

He was shaken out of his thoughts as she suddenly moved, eyes flying open as she twisted in the sheets, tangling up in them.

“Sorry, sorry… I’m so sorry…”

“It’s alright,” he automatically said, reaching out to hold her hand and searching with his eyes for something, anything that would knock her out again, would put down her feverish state, would make her stop seeing these horrible things that her mind conjured up.

“No… I wasn’t fast enough… I’ll… I’m… Doctor,” she breathed out the last word as if it was holy, carried on the air she exhaled and landing lightly on his skin.

He made the mistake of looking at her, dilated pupils and glistening skin.

“Sorry,” she repeated, sighing quietly as he stroked her hair.

“Not your fault,” he assured her, no idea if she could even hear or comprehend what he was saying, or if she was even talking to him in her delirious state. But suddenly her eyes were open, really open, and looking directly at him and his breath caught in something very akin to hope.

“Doctor?” she said, her voice curious, searching.

“I’m here.”

“Doctor, I love you.”

His eyes flew up to meet hers, wide as she smiled slowly and her eyes started getting heavy again. She frowned then, breathing through her mouth and looking like a little china-doll with her pale hair and skin.

“I’m cold,” she said, her voice rough. Her fingers twisted in his grip and he realized he must be crushing her hand with how hard he was grasping it. He let go and she closed her eyes, her breathing uneven and hitching.

Time was never a straight line for him, and even when it was it was still mind-boggling what with the changing companions and regenerations. He did have a knack for using up those pretty fast. But lately it had become very distinct patterns of before and after.

Before the Time War. After the Time War. Before Rose.

After Rose

He wondered if the momentum of two hearts beating out of sync was enough to rip someone’s chest apart.

It felt like it.

oOo

“So, I feel loads better.”

The Doctor glared at her. Rose visibly swallowed. Hello, Oncoming Storm.

“But really. I’m sure you could let me up to…”

“No.”

“But…”

“No.”

Rose sighed and pouted for the winning awards. The Doctor looked away. She made her eyes round and forced tears into them. The Doctor looked pointedly at the floor as if it was the most interesting thing he’d ever seen.

Rose sighed heavily. The Doctor looked up, lightly smirking now, though it faded away as soon as his eyes fell on her.

“C’mon,” Rose muttered. “I can’t look that bad.”

Silence.

“See, this is exactly why you should let me up to have a sho…”

“No.”

“But I could really use a bloody shower!”

“No.”

“Doc…”

“No.”

“You….”

“No.”

Rose clenched her teeth together, ignoring the slight headache that was coming on. He really wasn’t going to make this easy.

“Please try to be reasonable,” she said, desperately ignoring the thunderous expression that crossed his face. “I’ve been in this bed for three days and I feel disgusting and a shower would really help me feel better, yeah?”

He looked so tense, and she wondered if he’d slept at all while she had been sick.

“Rose, you aren’t well enough to get up on your own, let alone stand for whatever unreasonable amount of time it takes for you to shower.”

Rose narrowed her eyes. “I don’t take long showers.”

“Well…”

“I should punch you.”

“Now, who does that to their doctor?”

“Ugh. It’s not nice teasing the ill person you know!” she defended herself, regretting her words as soon as she saw all the light leave him, his shoulders yet again set in tense shadows.

“You’re not well enough,” he repeated, and she’d been with him long enough to catch the slight nuances in his voice, to not just hear the warning or the caring in that sentence, but that hidden fear that made him watch her like a hawk, afraid she would keel over and die any minute now.

Rose sighed. She knew she wasn’t dammit, having just gotten over her fever, but she just felt so icky sitting here in sweat and blood and tears – okay, maybe not so dramatic as that, but icky nonetheless.

“Well, then maybe you could bathe me?” it just slipped out. She really hadn’t meant to just say it.

Honestly.

The Doctor blushed scarlet for a moment, before glaring at her again, though his faltering was a sure sign that she had caught him off guard. Rose bit her lip, happy that she’d managed to one-up him even in her pitiful state.

“I got you your tooth-brush,” he mumbled, looking down at his hands that were currently busy folding at each other, resting on his legs. Rose wanted nothing more than to reach out and take them in her own, but with the way he was acting she was a bit afraid of how he would react. The fact that he hadn’t taken her hand at all since she’d woken, though she’d reached for it, spoke volumes.

She told herself it was just worry. Not contempt or maybe a realization of how fragile she really was, a realization that would lead him to bring her back home.

Rose gritted her teeth. As if she would let him do that. She definitely wasn’t going without a fight.

“Rose?” he interrupted her thoughts. “You alright?”

She blinked and upon realizing that he hadn’t thrown her out yet, quickly schooled her features and sent him one of her biggest smiles.

“Oh yeah, brilliant. Absolutely fantastic. So, shower now?”

“No.”

“I hate you,” she pouted, expecting him to smirk and rebuke like he usually did, but instead his face shifted yet again, the smile falling away, an odd expression moving in his eyes and that… was his ears turning red?

“Um, Doctor, you know I didn’t mean it, right?”

Now he was blushing again.

“Look, I have to go and… do some… I have to go check up on the TARDIS readings, yeah?” he practically jumped from his seat, only stopping to look at her sternly. “You stay in bed, you hear me?”

Rose leaned even further back on the pillows. “Of course, Doctor,” she said, watching him tiredly as he walked – practically ran, what was his problem? – out of the door, sitting up as soon as his footsteps faded.

Stay in bed. As if.

oOo

Her knees felt incredibly wobbly and her legs weak, but she managed to get unnoticed and unharmed to the bathroom, and as soon as she was standing under the hot spray she felt absolutely amazing, three days of panic washing away from her body in warm water and soapy bubbles.

She turned up the heat just a notch more, not for the first time glad that the TARDIS had a seemingly never-ending supply of hot water. It felt so good for her aching muscles to just stand there, face turned upwards and eyes closed firmly, forgetting for a moment just how ill she’d been only a few hours ago. How near death had seemed these last couple of days.

Rose was a little surprised at how well she was taking this herself, to be honest: she didn’t think she’d ever actually been so certain she was gone for before. Alright, well, if you didn’t count the Autons back in Henrik’s basement. Or on Platform One, with the sun-rays beaming in ready to roast her. Or trapped in another basement, this time with the Gelth. Or with the Slitheen, and then the missile to kill the Slitheen. And the Dalek, of course. And the Reapers and…

Okay. Maybe not so surprised at how accustomed she’d become to the life-threatening situations. Maybe there really was a reason the Doctor called her jeopardy-friendly.

Still, all of those times, it had been in the moment of action, a surprise. It hadn’t been sneaking up on her. It hadn’t been her own body betraying her, slowly killing her from the inside-out. It hadn’t been slow and torturous and she hadn’t begged for help, the way she was certain she had done multiple times in her delirium.

That and… certain other things that she hoped to god the Doctor hadn’t paid closer attention to.

Deciding that enough was enough, and she was after all still alive and didn’t need to dwell on it anymore, she shifted a bit out of the spray and reached for the soap, only now noticing how tired her arm really was, how tired her entire body was.

And with that thought, her legs almost gave out and she had only about a second to wonder how bad it would be if she hit her head on the floor, when two arms suddenly encircled her and she was surrounded by leather, being held up and pressed against a solid chest.

The water was beating down on both of them, and the Doctor was still wearing clothes. He didn’t seem to care.

“Oh,” she mumbled, looking around to meet his eyes. “Oh, thanks. Um, sorry… look I just really wanted… I should have listened to you, but… how long have you been in here, exactly?”

He didn’t answer her question, didn’t say anything in fact, his eyes searching her face. There was something deep and unfathomable in there, and she felt lost for a moment, enthralled, but then he blinked and the moment was over. He righted her up to stand and, to her great surprise, stepped even closer, his arms still locked around her.

“Doctor?” she whispered, and he closed his eyes, leaning his forehead against hers. He was so close and she was very aware of the fact that she was naked and pressed against rough denim that couldn’t quite hide the evidence that he was affected by her.

Very affected.

Oh.

His mouth slid down to her ear, his cheek resting against hers and her arms automatically came up to wrap around his shoulders, responding to him automatically and not caring at all that her bones were still aching: she needed him closer.

“Why do you never do as you’re told?” he whispered into her ear, and there weren’t any nuances or hidden tones, he just sounded broken now.

“Sorry,” she said, but really, if this was the result, how could she be? She felt his fingers travel up her back to play with the ends of her soaked hair and briefly wondered if she was still ill in bed, dreaming this entire thing up.

Only one way to find out, she thought, moving her head slightly to nuzzle against his shoulder.

“So, changed your mind about giving me that bath now?” she asked, startling when he let out a loud laugh, his fingers skimming her sides and trailing lines of fire in their wake.

“I…” he said, but didn’t finish, and then he pulled away and oh, it wasn’t a dream then, and he was going to leave and she was going to look like a fool and he would definitely take her home now…

He kissed her.

Rose could honestly say she had never been this thoroughly kissed before, in her entire life (which, granted, wasn’t very long, but she’d been around, especially after meeting the Doctor and why was she even thinking about this when she had the bloody Doctor’s tongue in her mouth?)

He was definitely dominating the kiss, tongue sweeping up to lick the roof of her mouth and all she could do was moan and cling to him and feel his double-heartbeat race against her chest.

Her naked chest.

She pulled away with great effort. “Wait. Stop. You… Ah!” she shrieked as he suddenly let go of her and she stumbled yet again, only saved from bruises and scrapes by the Doctor’s quick reflexes. Only his hands rested on her now, as if he was afraid of having her close again.

“Right,” he started before she could gather herself to continue. “Sorry, Rose I… I’m… I’ll just take you back to bed, yeah? Right and then… yeah, right, bed and you don’t… I’m sorry, you’re still weak and I shouldn’t have taken advantage.”

Rose blinked at him. “Um, Doctor?”

All defences back on, his jaw clenched as he gazed down at her, doing his best to keep his eyes level with her face and not let them stray… anywhere else. “Yeah?”

“Slow down, okay?”

“Yes, exactly,” he said and he might be a mighty Time Lord and the Oncoming Storm, but right now all he resembled was really a kicked puppy and Rose didn’t know if she should laugh or cry or maybe both.

“I meant the talking. You have a knack for it,” she gently teased, leaning against him a little more than she actually needed. “I was just going to say… I think you’re wearing too many clothes. A bit unfair, that.”

He stared at her, and kept doing so for long enough for Rose to fidget a bit and become worried that he had snapped back to his senses, had realized that of course he didn’t want some stupid ape and that he better get the hell out of there as fast as he could.

Next thing, she was being pushed against the wall and his tongue was in her mouth again.

Well, okay.

“Thought I’d lost you,” he got out as she struggled to get his jacket off while being very distracted by the kisses he was pressing against her jaw and neck and collar-bone and lower.

She had no idea where she had the energy to scream like that when he sucked a nipple into his mouth, nevermind that she had never really been a screamer before, because the sparkle in his eyes was well worth it.

“Not getting rid of me so easily,” she said, finally wrestling the jacket off. “Couldn’t well go before I’d had alien-sex now, could I?”

He stilled against her, head moving upwards to nuzzle the soft spot where her jaw met her neck.

“Not funny,” he said, biting down gently on her earlobe before she could answer.

“Don’t… don’t worry,” she gasped out, wondering where the hell those hands of his had learned to do such wonderful things. “When I say ‘alien-sex’ I mean ‘Doctor-sex’,”

“Good,” he said, sounding way too smug. “I’m going to hold you to that.”

It was her turn to pull away again, letting her head rest on the cool wall behind her. “You’re not just saying that, right?”

“What?” he got out, and she tried to ignore the burst of pride that she had made him like this, all slow and groaning and rumpled.

“You’re not going to throw me out in the morning or pretend this never happened?”

“You worried about that?”

She blinked tears away. “Yeah. I’m always worried about that.”

He had the gall to laugh at her again, and she briefly entertained the notion of smacking him, but then his hands were cradling her face and he was kissing her nose, her eyelids, her cheekbones, her mouth and she was lost.

“No,” he said, lips inches away from hers, one of his hands sliding away from her face and downwards. “I’m not gonna throw you out.”

“You promise?” she whispered, only half-aware of his hand brushing her curls down there, very close now to another place that was burning.

“Yes,” he said, his fingers skimming over just there and she gasped, his lips crashing against hers again. He withdrew his hand, despite her protesting noises, reached over to turn the shower off and shook his head to get the water out, making it her turn to laugh. He smirked and leaned over to kiss her, but she pushed him gently away, tugging at the ends of his soaked jumper and raising an eyebrow.

“Off!” She demanded, grinning proudly as he did as he was told without missing a beat.

“There’s a good boy,” she teased, her smile faltering as he sent her a look of such heated passion that her legs felt like giving out again, this time for very different reasons.

She let him kiss her then and her hands splayed out over his now bare chest, enjoying his shivers and the way his skin warmed under hers. It felt weird, two heart-beats instead of one, but maybe it would be even weirder if there wasn’t something different, and she was too busy concentrating on the hard push of his hips against hers, of his hands splayed over her backside and the feel of his skin under her palms to really care that much about it.

“Always wondered if you had a sex-drive,” she mumbled as he kissed his way down to her shoulder. He bit down gently there, soothing it with his tongue and snickered quietly at her words.

“Around you I do.”

“Really?” she muttered, hands sliding down to the top of his jeans, ignoring the pit of fire in her belly that blazes at his words.

“Yep,” he raised his head, and suddenly looked so very tall, standing over her in the shower, still having the advantage even now. A smile forms on her face.

“I love you,” she said, because she needs to say it and because she finds it just a bit satisfying how he faltered slightly, how his pupils dilate even more, how his hearts starts beating faster and how he looked at her as if she’s just saved the entire universe with a smile.

She reached forward before he could say anything, determined to get rid of those jeans and not let the moment be ruined by his not saying it back, and the Doctor seemed to agree, one large hand splayed over her stomach and the other helping her push his trousers down and suddenly he’s really pressed against her, and it’s such a sharp contrast, the wall and his warm body and she’s so very glad that he’s holding her up, because she wouldn’t have been able to stand on her own anyway.

She wraps her legs around his waist and he lifts her up, and whispers ‘ready?’ and she can only nod and then he’s pressing into her and she’s gasping and moving and clenching around him and wondering how it could feel so perfect when they’re pushing against each other and her back is scraping against a cold wall and her limbs are shaking from exhaustion and she’d very nearly died.

His fingers dig into her hips, his groans leaving puffs of air against her over-heated skin and that’s her name he’s moaning and that’s bloody fantastic, and she’s never clung to someone like this before, never been so scared of letting go.

“Rose,” he whispers, lips moving against her neck and her nails dig into his back when she comes, shouting and begging, aware that he follows only seconds later.

She buries her face in his shoulder as he gently slides out of her, her feet hits the floor and his arms around her again, holding her up. He’s whispering something against her hair, but she can’t hear, is too tired to ask him to speak up. His hand finally reaches up and lifts her chin, making her look at him.

“You need sleep,” he said, taking in her tired eyes. Rose smiled lazily as he picked her up again, her legs wrapped around his waist and very determined to drag him into that bed with her.