lostwolf | Enraptured

Part One, Part Two

Part Three: Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick, Hit Me, Hit Me

The Doctor lay beneath his sleeping beauty and wondered what, in all his lives, he had done to deserve such perfection. He’d made slow, languid, worshipful love to her and now she was resting again, her poor pregnant body struggling to find the energy to stay conscious despite her desire. So he drew words of love on her bare back with his fingertips, tracing vows of eternity across her skin, promises he knew he could never really make to her. Her forever was so short and his forever with her so dangerous it was as like as not to shorten it still further. Each moment with her in his arms was forcing him more forcefully to acknowledge the precarious nature of his present happiness and the terrible growing certainty that something was going to destroy this fragile, precious, flawless moment in time. It was like trying to protect a candle flame in a storm and he knew that ultimately the flame would be snuffed out; it was just a matter of when. His arms convulsed around her involuntarily and she stirred against him, her breath tickling against his chest and warming the ice striving to grow around his hearts.

‘Doctor?’ she muttered groggily.

‘Hello,’ he whispered, hoping the catch in his throat would not be discernable.

‘Mmm, ‘ello.’ She snuggled against him, rubbing her head against his chest like a sleepy kitten. He felt tears prick at the backs of his eyes and cleared his throat hurriedly.

‘How are you feeling?’

‘’kay.’

‘Not sick? Dizzy?’

‘Uh,uh. Not right now.’

He beamed. ‘Time for a treat, then,’ he announced, ‘Come on, up you get. Dress for the seventies. Nineteen seventies.’ He rolled her onto her back, pressed a quick kiss to her lips and leapt from the bed. He needed to move. He needed to get them out of the TARDIS, to do something, to burn through the nervous, clawing panic building once more beneath his skin. Either that or stay in bed with her, holding her in his arms and keeping them in the vortex indefinitely. Which he couldn’t do. Not because he wouldn’t but because Rose wouldn’t let him. She’d demanded they do something, last night, between lovemaking. Time away from her mum. Time together. Fun. Adventure. Before she was too big to run. He refused to do adventure, but fun and time together, that he could grant.   He ran to the console room as if, with swift feet alone, he could hold back the demons that haunted him.

‘What do you think of this? Will it do?’ Rose wandered into the console room wearing the most ridiculously tiny dungaree dress he had ever seen. He stared at her, torn between tearing it off of her, right there, against the console and telling her she was not going out dressed like that. The demons nipped at his heels and he did neither.

‘In the late 1970s? You'd be better off in a bin bag. Hold on, listen to this. Ian Dury and the Blockheads. Number One in 1979.’

‘You're a Punk!’

He grinned. Time for some fun.

**************

Well, that had gone well, hadn’t it? His driving skills as superb as ever and instead of a fun holiday he’d nearly got Rose skewered by a werewolf, not to mention the running and lifting and doing all sorts of things he was pretty sure she shouldn’t be doing and was very sure he didn’t want her doing. Rose had laughed through it, teasing and almost desperately light-hearted as his fear had grown exponentially. Right up until the moment they had stepped inside, she’d been laughing and lightening his heart. As soon as they were home, though, that had all changed. It was like a switch had been thrown. And now she was leaning against the wall of the console room, eyes closed, face pale, breathing in fiercely through her nose. She shuddered, pressing one hand tight to her belly, her face somehow paling still further. With a jolt of panic, he was beside her in an instant, stethoscope pulled from his pocket.

‘Rose?’

‘Feel funny.’ Her voice was tiny and his hearts lurched.

‘Okay. I need you to sit down.’

‘I’m scared to move. Something’s… odd.’ He tried to breathe past his panic, only to decide breathing was an unnecessary luxury. His respiratory bypass kicked in as, tenderly, he dropped to his knees before her, wrapping his hands around her waist and resting his forehead against her belly. Letting one hand trail down, he grabbed her hand and pressed it to his mouth, smelling then tasting her with almost unbearable trepidation. He could sense her stress, fear, sweat from running, distress at the deaths they’d witnessed, but nothing to explain the odd feeling that had frightened her. Rubbing his thumb back and forward over her pulse at the inside of her wrist, he steadied himself. Slowly, he pressed the earpieces of his stethoscope into his ears and positioned it against her belly, focusing desperately. He forced his senses to ignore the shush of her blood flowing, the gurgle of her hungry stomach and the frightened thudding of her heart, funnelling all his energy into hearing beyond her and to the child within. There. Ridiculously soft and perfect. A heart beat. He grinned, his breathing restarting with excited relief.

‘Oh Rose!’ he gasped, looking up at her adoringly.

‘What is it? Have I hurt it?’   She swayed and he leapt to his feet with alacrity, grasping her firmly.

‘No! The baby’s fine, Rose. It’s just developing.’

‘You sure? Why do I feel funny?’

‘Because this isn’t a human baby, Rose, it’s a Gallifreyan, and its heart just started beating properly, its brain has begun development. It’s the spark, Rose. You felt the first flickers of our baby’s consciousness whisper into life. I didn’t think you’d be able to feel it, not being telepathic, but you’ve always been amazing, so I don’t know why I’m surprised. You’ll feel everything. Each bit of development. Its part of you, after all. Really a part of you. You can’t lose it, not without…’

Rose interrupted him, much to his relief, her finger moving to rest against his lips. ‘It’s alright?’

‘Yes!’

‘And you could hear it, before, with your stethoscope?’

‘Oh yes, Rose. It was beautiful.’ Tears pricked his eyes and she stared at him.

‘Can I hear?’

‘Oh,’ he shuffled guiltily, one hand scrubbing at the back of his neck. ‘Thing is, special ears me. Super duper Time Lord lugs. You know, jump buildings in a single bound type super. If they had legs, which they don’t. So that was a pointless sort of analogy, really, wasn’t it? Must be all the stress, making me crap. And here I thought only the mother’s brain shrunk during pregnancy. All that progesterone, and brain fodder being redirected to the little tyke. You know, it really is quite…’

‘Doctor!’

‘What? Oh. Right. Um. What? Ah. Yes. Listening. Well. I’m sorry, Rose, but you won’t be able to… wait! Oh, I’m good.’ With a whoop, he hugged her tighter to him, lifting her into his arms as he took off for the infirmary. Placing her on a bed, he kissed her tenderly, before beginning to root around in various drawers, unidentifiable objects clattering to the floor as he flung them over his shoulder in displeasure. ‘No, no, nope… that’s not it, no… ah ha!’ Triumphant, he swung towards her holding aloft a small pink cone.

Rose frowned. ‘Um… wow?’ she hazarded, wondering what on Earth it was and why the Doctor was so pleased to have found it.

‘It’s a stethoscope, Rose.’

Rose wrinkled her nose, ‘It really isn’t, Doctor.’

‘Well, alright, it isn’t. But it does the same job. Take your top off,’ he instructed. Rose raised an eyebrow in suspicion, but dutifully undid the catches holding the dress bib up then lifted her t-shirt. As soon as her flesh was bared, the Doctor whipped forward and popped the cone, fat end down, against her skin. Immediately, the air was filled with the sound of gurgling. ‘Opps, that’s your stomach. Better feed you in a minute! Wait, here we go.’ He moved the device sideways and down slightly and suddenly muffled beating replaced the embarrassing growl of her stomach.

Rose’s eyes widened. ‘Is that?’

‘That’s our baby,’ the Doctor confirmed, grinning broadly. Rose reached out and instantly his free hand found hers and gripped tightly.

‘Wow!’

‘Yep.’

‘It’s amaz… oh.’

Naturally, Rose chose that magic moment to vomit all over them both.

Part Four

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Date: 2008-06-09 05:12 pm (UTC)

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