The Sting: Chapter 3
Title: The Sting
Author: Annissa
Character/Pairing: Nine/Rose
Rating: Teen
Summary: Rose's dreams become more vivid, creating a rift between herself and her hosts.
Disclaimer: Doctor Who is the property of the BBC.
Author's Notes: This story is outlined from the Futurama episode of the same name. Their version is funny. Mine, not so much.
The book excerpt from the English translation of "Solaris," by Stanisław Lem.
BIG thanks to yumimum for the beta!
Chapter 1 - Chapter 2
Rose runs back to the village as quickly as she can and immediately looks for Afonwil. It takes her longer than she expected to find the leader of these people, but it eventually emerges from one of the huts alongside several other merpeople.
“Afonwil!” she shouts and everyone in the group looks surprised. “Afonwil, I found it! I found the gift the Doctor told me about in my dream!” She drops the rucksack on the ground and begins to open it.
The group of people around Afonwil looks confused, but Afonwil has a grave look on his face. He tells his group that he will be back and approaches Rose as she rummages around in the bag.
Rose pulls the book out and holds it up. “This!” she shouts triumphantly.
Afonwil takes the book and looks at it curiously. “What is it?” it asks.
“It’s a book,” Rose says, deflating a little.
“What does it do?”
“It... it doesn’t really do anything. Tells a story, maybe?”
“Like a dream, then?”
“Not exactly.” How can she explain the difference between a story book and a dream? She feels frustration beginning to set in. “It’s like... like the stories on the walls of your homes. Only sometimes the stories didn’t actually happen.”
“And is the story is this book real?”
The conversation is beginning to get away from her, so she tries to steer it back in the right direction. “Afonwil, I think the Doctor is still alive!”
The merpeople around them start whispering among themselves.
Afonwil offers Rose a hand and helps her get to her feet. The rucksack is nearly the same size as the merperson, but that doesn’t stop it lifting it by a strap and throwing it across its back. It pulls her towards the hut she spent the night in.
When they are inside, it tosses the book on the mattress, sets the bag down nearby and turns to face her.
“Rose,” it says. “I can tell you with certainty that he died. You yourself saw him get stung, and were with him when he died. I watched his body burn in the fire.” Its voice is hard, but not unkind. “You need to accept this. You cannot heal until you do.”
“But you don’t know him!” Rose says, her voice cracking, but defiant. “You don’t know what he can do. The things I’ve seen him do!”
“I have seen death and I have seen grief. You make me fear I will soon witness it again.” This is all he says before he turns to leave.
A sob escapes Rose’s lips and she falls on the mattress. She picks up the book, the cover a blur through her tears. How is this supposed to help? She flips through the pages and stops at a random spot.
“I felt myself being invaded through and through, I crumbled, disintegrated, and only emptiness remained.”
She throws the book to the floor and stares at it. It falls next to the stoneware bottle containing the twyline. She doesn’t stop to consider before she lifts it to her lips and takes two swallows in quick succession. She barely has time to get back to her bed before she is unconscious.
She is again wearing the filmy dress, but this time she stands before an enormous frozen wave on the desolate shores of Woman Wept. The sound of waves in the distance confirm that she is dreaming. The water here does not move.
“I think I’m going mad,” she says.
“Would it help if I told you you’re not?” a voice says to her right. Her imagination fills in the rest of the picture - tall, dark-haired, blue-eyed, battered leather jacket - and suddenly, he is standing beside her.
She cracks a smile. “Maybe.”
She shivers, and is annoyed at her subconscious for dressing her so poorly for this environment.
“Here,” he says, removing his jacket and wrapping it around her shoulders. “Looks like you need this more than I do.” He adjusts the collar so it fits snugly against her skin.
He feels so real to her. Before she can think about it, she reaches around him and hugs him tightly around the waist. She expects him to pull away, but he doesn’t. Instead, he wraps his arms around her and hugs her just as tightly.
“The merpeople don’t dream,” she says into his chest.
“Really?” the Doctor says. “That’s a first. I was beginning to think all sentient beings dreamed. It’s a big universe, though. Bound to come across at least one that doesn’t!” He moves his hand to her head and gently strokes her hair.
“How can I convince them that you’re real? That you’re alive?”
“Is it really them that you need to convince?”
She pulls away to look him in the eye. “What do I need to do?”
He places his hands on either side of her face and stoops just a bit to look her directly in the eye. “All you need to do is wake up.”
The effect of his words is like ice water on warm skin. She shouts for him to wait, but it is too late; the dream world dissolves. She is still shouting it when she bolts upright in her bed, the embers of her fire barely illuminating the pictures on the walls. She is so disoriented that it takes several moments for her to realize that the Doctor’s jacket is still draped around her shoulders.
It is still dark when Rose leaves her hut in search of Afonwil, the Doctor’s jacket clutched in one hand. Only a couple of merpeople are up and about, and it is one of them that points her in the direction of Afonwil’s hut. She knocks on the board next to the fabric that covers the entryway and waits. Afonwil pushes aside the material and invites her in immediately.
“Rose! Is everything all right?”
“He’s alive, Afonwil! The Doctor’s alive!” Rose practically shouts.
Afonwil’s face darkens. Literally. The light blue of his skin deepens and his eyes turn a stormy grey. “Rose, this is not healthy. You need to stop.”
“You think I’m mad, but I’m not! He gave me his jacket in my dream and I woke up with it!” She holds the jacket out as proof.
“Rose, that’s not a jacket.” Afonwil says. He gently takes the leather from Rose and shakes it out. It is a simple hide, soft and worn from use, but certainly not an article of clothing. “It is a bed covering. I have one, too.” He points at a nearby pallet where a nearly identical hide lays.
“But,” Rose stutters. “I was wearing it when I woke up!”
“Have you taken the twyline again? You need to be careful. It seems to have a strange effect on your species. I’m beginning to wonder if it is causing your confusion.”
“I’m not confused!” Rose shouts. “I’ll prove he’s alive!” She storms out of Afonwil’s hut and back to her own.
She looks around the space. She doesn’t belong here. She doesn’t know why she felt the need to prove anything to Afonwil or any of the merpeople. She is a visitor that has overstayed her welcome and it’s time she moved on. She decides to go back to the TARDIS and think about her next move. She packs up her things quickly and as she takes a final look around the room, she notices the bottle of twyline and tucks it into her rucksack as well. She throws the bag over her shoulder and leaves the hut for the last time.
Before she reaches the outskirts of the village, a little merperson approaches shyly.
“Are you leaving?” it asks in a piping voice.
“Yeah,” Rose confirms, but she doesn’t break her pace.
“I heard you say your friend is still alive. Is it true?” the little one shouts after her.
Rose stops and turns to look at the tiny person. She is quiet for a long moment while she thinks of how to answer. Finally, she asks, “What’s your name?”
“Haiwyn,” the little one answers with a slight whistle.
“You’re the one that fell when that monster attacked, aren’t you?”
Haiwyn nods, but doesn’t speak.
“Well, Haiwyn...” Rose pronounces the merperson’s name carefully. “I think he might be.”
“How?”
“When I take the twyline, he comes to me in my dreams. Sometimes he tells me where to find things. Sometimes he gives me things.”
“The twyline brings him back?” The eyes of the little merperson are huge and starry, like it is on the verge of tears.
“I don’t know.” Rose answers, shaking her head. “I just know that I’ve seen him and I’ve talked to him. I don’t know how, but I’m going to find him.”
No one else stops her as she leaves the village and she returns to the TARDIS quickly. She sets her rucksack down just inside the doors and looks around the console room, unsure of what to do next. She decides to take a walk. She’ll be here for a while, so she may as well start learning her way around the TARDIS’s complicated interior corridors.
She is amazed at the things she finds, though she knows she shouldn’t be. That the TARDIS is an amazing place isn’t news to her. She finds countless storage closets, bedrooms, a spare galley, something that looks very much like the console room except that it is white and rather plain, a swimming pool, and two different gardens, one filled with mechanical, wind-up rabbits. She begins to feel tired and lonely and heads back to the familiar console room. That is where she feels closest to the Doctor, and that is where she wants to be.
She notices the jacket folded neatly on the jump seat, exactly where she’d left it, with the screwdriver set on top and her stomach twists. She picks them up and sets them on the console and settles onto the jump seat. She stares at the time rotor. Time. She has all of it she needs now. There’s nowhere to go, nothing to do, and no one to see. The time stretching out in front of her seems interminable. She misses her mother, her friends, and most of all, the Doctor.
As the tears tumble down her cheeks, she remembers the twyline. One swallow to help her relax, two to help her sleep, three to put her to sleep for the rest of her life. She quickly discards the idea of taking three drinks. It hasn’t come to that. It won’t come to that. But... the other two times she’s taken it, she’s seen the Doctor in her dreams. She hopes he’ll give her another clue if she sees him again. It’s a comforting thought. She gets up and gets the bottle of twyline out of her rucksack.
As she walks back to the jumpseat, she pulls the stopper from the bottle and takes a swallow. The cool liquid slides down her throat and warms her belly. She feels instantly calmer. She takes a second drink and sets the bottle down on the console. The twyline works quickly and she sways a bit on her feet. She catches herself by grabbing a lever, but knocks the bottle over in the process, spilling iridescent liquid over the controls and the jacket.
Rose swears and quickly rights the bottle, salvaging just a little of the liquid inside, then turns to go to the galley to get something to wipe up the liquid. A bright light behind her stops her.
The liquid drips down over the controls and onto the grating below, only instead of iridescent, it now glows gold. She watches in amazement as the glow grows in size and becomes humanoid in shape. In a matter of seconds, it is too bright to look at and she shields her eyes with her arm as the console room explodes in light. It fades as quickly as it grew.
It takes a moment for her eyes to adjust to the relative darkness of the console room, but as they do, she notices a figure standing in front of the console. A nude figure.
It turns to her and in an unmistakable Northern accent says, “Rose, where are my clothes?”
Rose gapes at him. The Doctor. It’s impossible. She knows it is. She also doesn’t care. She runs for him and grabs him in a massive hug. He seems to be not at all shy about his clothing situation and hugs her tightly in return.
“I thought you were dead!” Rose cries, tears streaming down her cheeks. “They all told me you died!” She pulls away to look him in the face. Blue eyes, not white. “Why aren’t you dead? I saw you die. What happened?”
“I don’t know,” the Doctor says, but he says it with a grin. “Last thing I remember was heading out the door to visit Arwinian, planet of the Hwylmnanians.” He says it with a bit of a whistle that Rose knows isn’t quite how you pronounce the name of the people who live on Arwinian. “Lovely people! Can breathe under water!”
“You were attacked,” Rose says. She quickly explains what happened, but skips over her own head injury and the dreams she’d been having. She does tell him about the twyline and how she spilled some on the console.
The Doctor turns to inspect the instruments, moving his jacket to the side, and runs his finger over some of the residue left from the spilled liquid. He tastes it and smacks his lips together. “Amazing!” he says. “This must have come into contact with some skin cells or hair that had fallen onto the console and mixed with the vortex energy to cause a spontaneous regeneration! It’s incredible! It’s even preserved my memories!”
He laughs and moves around the console, naming each of the controls as he checks for anything out of place, not caring in the least that he is completely undressed. Rose laughs in relief and joy and at the antics of the alien in front of her who looks indistinguishable from a human man.
When he is certain that his memory is in place and his TARDIS is unhurt, he becomes still and looks at Rose.
“Enjoying the view?” he asks, his eyes twinkling.
“Might be,” she answers, her tongue visible between her teeth as she grins.
“It seems to me that this is a bit unfair. You have me at a disadvantage.” He clasps his hands behind his back - the control panel the only thing protecting his modesty - and rolls back on his heels, grinning.
Rose blushes and is unsure what to do. He’s right, of course. She shouldn’t be staring at him when he has nothing to cover himself with. For the first time, she averts her eyes and starts to turn towards the corridor to her room.
“Don’t go,” he says.
She stands still, not looking at him, but no longer leaving, either.
“Come here.”
She slowly turns around and begins to walk towards him. When she gets close enough, he puts his hands on her hips. She looks up into his eyes and in the silence she is certain she can hear the waves of the sea crashing against the shore outside the ship.
He leans in close, not quite touching her ear with his lips, and whispers, “Tell me, Rose. What do you want?”
She shivers in his grasp and whispers, “You. I just want you.”
He runs his lips along her jawline. “Good.” One of his hands moves to the small of her back while he drags the fingers of the other up her spine and into her hair. He cradles her head in his hand and moves his lips to her mouth.
She opens her mouth slightly and tastes his lips against hers.
He pulls away a little and says, “Rose, I’m not human. I need you to understand that it won’t be like it is with a human.”
“I don’t care,” she replies.
He gives her his manic grin. “Fantastic!” Then his grin fades and his eyebrows furrow. “But first, there’s one thing I need you to do.”
“What is it?” she asks. She is excited and happy, but she has a terrible sinking feeling in her gut.
“I need you to wake up.”
She looks at him in shock. The world has never felt more tangible. She can feel his hand in her hair and smell the subtle, sweet scent of his skin. His eyes are blue and vivid and impossibly real. Impossibly.
“But, no! This is real,” she sputters as the world around her, the impossible, wonderful, incredible world around her dissolves and she wakes on the hard grating of the console floor.
She looks up and sees the twyline bottle sitting upright on the clean, dry surface of the console. She screams at the injustice of the dream and of a world where she is so close to what she wants and so very far from it at the same time.
Chapter 4
Author: Annissa
Character/Pairing: Nine/Rose
Rating: Teen
Summary: Rose's dreams become more vivid, creating a rift between herself and her hosts.
Disclaimer: Doctor Who is the property of the BBC.
Author's Notes: This story is outlined from the Futurama episode of the same name. Their version is funny. Mine, not so much.
The book excerpt from the English translation of "Solaris," by Stanisław Lem.
BIG thanks to yumimum for the beta!
Chapter 1 - Chapter 2
Rose runs back to the village as quickly as she can and immediately looks for Afonwil. It takes her longer than she expected to find the leader of these people, but it eventually emerges from one of the huts alongside several other merpeople.
“Afonwil!” she shouts and everyone in the group looks surprised. “Afonwil, I found it! I found the gift the Doctor told me about in my dream!” She drops the rucksack on the ground and begins to open it.
The group of people around Afonwil looks confused, but Afonwil has a grave look on his face. He tells his group that he will be back and approaches Rose as she rummages around in the bag.
Rose pulls the book out and holds it up. “This!” she shouts triumphantly.
Afonwil takes the book and looks at it curiously. “What is it?” it asks.
“It’s a book,” Rose says, deflating a little.
“What does it do?”
“It... it doesn’t really do anything. Tells a story, maybe?”
“Like a dream, then?”
“Not exactly.” How can she explain the difference between a story book and a dream? She feels frustration beginning to set in. “It’s like... like the stories on the walls of your homes. Only sometimes the stories didn’t actually happen.”
“And is the story is this book real?”
The conversation is beginning to get away from her, so she tries to steer it back in the right direction. “Afonwil, I think the Doctor is still alive!”
The merpeople around them start whispering among themselves.
Afonwil offers Rose a hand and helps her get to her feet. The rucksack is nearly the same size as the merperson, but that doesn’t stop it lifting it by a strap and throwing it across its back. It pulls her towards the hut she spent the night in.
When they are inside, it tosses the book on the mattress, sets the bag down nearby and turns to face her.
“Rose,” it says. “I can tell you with certainty that he died. You yourself saw him get stung, and were with him when he died. I watched his body burn in the fire.” Its voice is hard, but not unkind. “You need to accept this. You cannot heal until you do.”
“But you don’t know him!” Rose says, her voice cracking, but defiant. “You don’t know what he can do. The things I’ve seen him do!”
“I have seen death and I have seen grief. You make me fear I will soon witness it again.” This is all he says before he turns to leave.
A sob escapes Rose’s lips and she falls on the mattress. She picks up the book, the cover a blur through her tears. How is this supposed to help? She flips through the pages and stops at a random spot.
“I felt myself being invaded through and through, I crumbled, disintegrated, and only emptiness remained.”
She throws the book to the floor and stares at it. It falls next to the stoneware bottle containing the twyline. She doesn’t stop to consider before she lifts it to her lips and takes two swallows in quick succession. She barely has time to get back to her bed before she is unconscious.
She is again wearing the filmy dress, but this time she stands before an enormous frozen wave on the desolate shores of Woman Wept. The sound of waves in the distance confirm that she is dreaming. The water here does not move.
“I think I’m going mad,” she says.
“Would it help if I told you you’re not?” a voice says to her right. Her imagination fills in the rest of the picture - tall, dark-haired, blue-eyed, battered leather jacket - and suddenly, he is standing beside her.
She cracks a smile. “Maybe.”
She shivers, and is annoyed at her subconscious for dressing her so poorly for this environment.
“Here,” he says, removing his jacket and wrapping it around her shoulders. “Looks like you need this more than I do.” He adjusts the collar so it fits snugly against her skin.
He feels so real to her. Before she can think about it, she reaches around him and hugs him tightly around the waist. She expects him to pull away, but he doesn’t. Instead, he wraps his arms around her and hugs her just as tightly.
“The merpeople don’t dream,” she says into his chest.
“Really?” the Doctor says. “That’s a first. I was beginning to think all sentient beings dreamed. It’s a big universe, though. Bound to come across at least one that doesn’t!” He moves his hand to her head and gently strokes her hair.
“How can I convince them that you’re real? That you’re alive?”
“Is it really them that you need to convince?”
She pulls away to look him in the eye. “What do I need to do?”
He places his hands on either side of her face and stoops just a bit to look her directly in the eye. “All you need to do is wake up.”
The effect of his words is like ice water on warm skin. She shouts for him to wait, but it is too late; the dream world dissolves. She is still shouting it when she bolts upright in her bed, the embers of her fire barely illuminating the pictures on the walls. She is so disoriented that it takes several moments for her to realize that the Doctor’s jacket is still draped around her shoulders.
It is still dark when Rose leaves her hut in search of Afonwil, the Doctor’s jacket clutched in one hand. Only a couple of merpeople are up and about, and it is one of them that points her in the direction of Afonwil’s hut. She knocks on the board next to the fabric that covers the entryway and waits. Afonwil pushes aside the material and invites her in immediately.
“Rose! Is everything all right?”
“He’s alive, Afonwil! The Doctor’s alive!” Rose practically shouts.
Afonwil’s face darkens. Literally. The light blue of his skin deepens and his eyes turn a stormy grey. “Rose, this is not healthy. You need to stop.”
“You think I’m mad, but I’m not! He gave me his jacket in my dream and I woke up with it!” She holds the jacket out as proof.
“Rose, that’s not a jacket.” Afonwil says. He gently takes the leather from Rose and shakes it out. It is a simple hide, soft and worn from use, but certainly not an article of clothing. “It is a bed covering. I have one, too.” He points at a nearby pallet where a nearly identical hide lays.
“But,” Rose stutters. “I was wearing it when I woke up!”
“Have you taken the twyline again? You need to be careful. It seems to have a strange effect on your species. I’m beginning to wonder if it is causing your confusion.”
“I’m not confused!” Rose shouts. “I’ll prove he’s alive!” She storms out of Afonwil’s hut and back to her own.
She looks around the space. She doesn’t belong here. She doesn’t know why she felt the need to prove anything to Afonwil or any of the merpeople. She is a visitor that has overstayed her welcome and it’s time she moved on. She decides to go back to the TARDIS and think about her next move. She packs up her things quickly and as she takes a final look around the room, she notices the bottle of twyline and tucks it into her rucksack as well. She throws the bag over her shoulder and leaves the hut for the last time.
Before she reaches the outskirts of the village, a little merperson approaches shyly.
“Are you leaving?” it asks in a piping voice.
“Yeah,” Rose confirms, but she doesn’t break her pace.
“I heard you say your friend is still alive. Is it true?” the little one shouts after her.
Rose stops and turns to look at the tiny person. She is quiet for a long moment while she thinks of how to answer. Finally, she asks, “What’s your name?”
“Haiwyn,” the little one answers with a slight whistle.
“You’re the one that fell when that monster attacked, aren’t you?”
Haiwyn nods, but doesn’t speak.
“Well, Haiwyn...” Rose pronounces the merperson’s name carefully. “I think he might be.”
“How?”
“When I take the twyline, he comes to me in my dreams. Sometimes he tells me where to find things. Sometimes he gives me things.”
“The twyline brings him back?” The eyes of the little merperson are huge and starry, like it is on the verge of tears.
“I don’t know.” Rose answers, shaking her head. “I just know that I’ve seen him and I’ve talked to him. I don’t know how, but I’m going to find him.”
No one else stops her as she leaves the village and she returns to the TARDIS quickly. She sets her rucksack down just inside the doors and looks around the console room, unsure of what to do next. She decides to take a walk. She’ll be here for a while, so she may as well start learning her way around the TARDIS’s complicated interior corridors.
She is amazed at the things she finds, though she knows she shouldn’t be. That the TARDIS is an amazing place isn’t news to her. She finds countless storage closets, bedrooms, a spare galley, something that looks very much like the console room except that it is white and rather plain, a swimming pool, and two different gardens, one filled with mechanical, wind-up rabbits. She begins to feel tired and lonely and heads back to the familiar console room. That is where she feels closest to the Doctor, and that is where she wants to be.
She notices the jacket folded neatly on the jump seat, exactly where she’d left it, with the screwdriver set on top and her stomach twists. She picks them up and sets them on the console and settles onto the jump seat. She stares at the time rotor. Time. She has all of it she needs now. There’s nowhere to go, nothing to do, and no one to see. The time stretching out in front of her seems interminable. She misses her mother, her friends, and most of all, the Doctor.
As the tears tumble down her cheeks, she remembers the twyline. One swallow to help her relax, two to help her sleep, three to put her to sleep for the rest of her life. She quickly discards the idea of taking three drinks. It hasn’t come to that. It won’t come to that. But... the other two times she’s taken it, she’s seen the Doctor in her dreams. She hopes he’ll give her another clue if she sees him again. It’s a comforting thought. She gets up and gets the bottle of twyline out of her rucksack.
As she walks back to the jumpseat, she pulls the stopper from the bottle and takes a swallow. The cool liquid slides down her throat and warms her belly. She feels instantly calmer. She takes a second drink and sets the bottle down on the console. The twyline works quickly and she sways a bit on her feet. She catches herself by grabbing a lever, but knocks the bottle over in the process, spilling iridescent liquid over the controls and the jacket.
Rose swears and quickly rights the bottle, salvaging just a little of the liquid inside, then turns to go to the galley to get something to wipe up the liquid. A bright light behind her stops her.
The liquid drips down over the controls and onto the grating below, only instead of iridescent, it now glows gold. She watches in amazement as the glow grows in size and becomes humanoid in shape. In a matter of seconds, it is too bright to look at and she shields her eyes with her arm as the console room explodes in light. It fades as quickly as it grew.
It takes a moment for her eyes to adjust to the relative darkness of the console room, but as they do, she notices a figure standing in front of the console. A nude figure.
It turns to her and in an unmistakable Northern accent says, “Rose, where are my clothes?”
Rose gapes at him. The Doctor. It’s impossible. She knows it is. She also doesn’t care. She runs for him and grabs him in a massive hug. He seems to be not at all shy about his clothing situation and hugs her tightly in return.
“I thought you were dead!” Rose cries, tears streaming down her cheeks. “They all told me you died!” She pulls away to look him in the face. Blue eyes, not white. “Why aren’t you dead? I saw you die. What happened?”
“I don’t know,” the Doctor says, but he says it with a grin. “Last thing I remember was heading out the door to visit Arwinian, planet of the Hwylmnanians.” He says it with a bit of a whistle that Rose knows isn’t quite how you pronounce the name of the people who live on Arwinian. “Lovely people! Can breathe under water!”
“You were attacked,” Rose says. She quickly explains what happened, but skips over her own head injury and the dreams she’d been having. She does tell him about the twyline and how she spilled some on the console.
The Doctor turns to inspect the instruments, moving his jacket to the side, and runs his finger over some of the residue left from the spilled liquid. He tastes it and smacks his lips together. “Amazing!” he says. “This must have come into contact with some skin cells or hair that had fallen onto the console and mixed with the vortex energy to cause a spontaneous regeneration! It’s incredible! It’s even preserved my memories!”
He laughs and moves around the console, naming each of the controls as he checks for anything out of place, not caring in the least that he is completely undressed. Rose laughs in relief and joy and at the antics of the alien in front of her who looks indistinguishable from a human man.
When he is certain that his memory is in place and his TARDIS is unhurt, he becomes still and looks at Rose.
“Enjoying the view?” he asks, his eyes twinkling.
“Might be,” she answers, her tongue visible between her teeth as she grins.
“It seems to me that this is a bit unfair. You have me at a disadvantage.” He clasps his hands behind his back - the control panel the only thing protecting his modesty - and rolls back on his heels, grinning.
Rose blushes and is unsure what to do. He’s right, of course. She shouldn’t be staring at him when he has nothing to cover himself with. For the first time, she averts her eyes and starts to turn towards the corridor to her room.
“Don’t go,” he says.
She stands still, not looking at him, but no longer leaving, either.
“Come here.”
She slowly turns around and begins to walk towards him. When she gets close enough, he puts his hands on her hips. She looks up into his eyes and in the silence she is certain she can hear the waves of the sea crashing against the shore outside the ship.
He leans in close, not quite touching her ear with his lips, and whispers, “Tell me, Rose. What do you want?”
She shivers in his grasp and whispers, “You. I just want you.”
He runs his lips along her jawline. “Good.” One of his hands moves to the small of her back while he drags the fingers of the other up her spine and into her hair. He cradles her head in his hand and moves his lips to her mouth.
She opens her mouth slightly and tastes his lips against hers.
He pulls away a little and says, “Rose, I’m not human. I need you to understand that it won’t be like it is with a human.”
“I don’t care,” she replies.
He gives her his manic grin. “Fantastic!” Then his grin fades and his eyebrows furrow. “But first, there’s one thing I need you to do.”
“What is it?” she asks. She is excited and happy, but she has a terrible sinking feeling in her gut.
“I need you to wake up.”
She looks at him in shock. The world has never felt more tangible. She can feel his hand in her hair and smell the subtle, sweet scent of his skin. His eyes are blue and vivid and impossibly real. Impossibly.
“But, no! This is real,” she sputters as the world around her, the impossible, wonderful, incredible world around her dissolves and she wakes on the hard grating of the console floor.
She looks up and sees the twyline bottle sitting upright on the clean, dry surface of the console. She screams at the injustice of the dream and of a world where she is so close to what she wants and so very far from it at the same time.
Chapter 4