howl; a ten/rose fic.
howl, ten/rose, r
The Doctor took the power of the Time Vortex from Rose; but what if the Bad Wolf still lives within his companion? (A "sort of" companion piece to my fic something of the wolf.)
A fight broke out just as they finished their second drinks. Anything could have sparked it, but the Doctor had a strong suspicion that it was the way Rose was eating the cherries. The men sitting on the stools around them had been fixated on her from the moment she sat down, and it was just as she tied the second stem with her tongue that a pair-who had been rather chummy before-suddenly came to blows. 2,206 words
If you could only see the beast you've made of me
I held it in but now it seems you've set it running free
Screaming in the dark, I howl when we're apart
Drag my teeth across your chest to taste your beating heart
Now there's no holding back, I'm aching to attack
My blood is singing with your voice, I want to pour it out
The saints can't help me now, the ropes have been unbound
I hunt for you with bloodied feet across the hallowed ground
The Doctor had faced down any number of breath-taking situations, villains, and monsters. His life and the lives of entire planets had teetered on the brink of destruction. He’d seen wonders so beautiful they could blind with their dazzling splendor. He had run until his lungs felt ready to burst, until his legs were weak with exhaustion, until his very shoes were breaking at the seams. He’d tasted fear, burned with guilt, and his eyes had stung with bitter tears. Few in the universe could claim to have felt such a gamut of emotions, or to such a powerful extent.
Strange, how all of that seemed to pale in comparison to the surge of adrenaline and elation he felt when Rose turned to look at him like that, her eyes full of promise and her mouth curving into that tantalizing cherry-hued crescent he had memorized months ago.
“I feel wild tonight,” she announced, tossing the hair from her eyes. She stretched her arms over her head until the hem of her shirt rose just enough, and he felt his stomach tighten in response.
“Oh?” he managed to say nonchalantly, resisting the urge to lick his dry lips.
“I feel like a walk. Maybe a run.”
“A run?”
“Yeah. I suddenly feel like I need to move, y’know? Let’s go to the pub in town. I could really go for a martini right now. Or maybe a Bloody Mary.”
A fight broke out just as they finished their second drinks. Anything could have sparked it, but the Doctor had a strong suspicion that it was the way Rose was eating the cherries. The men sitting on the stools around them had been fixated on her from the moment she sat down, and it was just as she tied the second stem with her tongue that a pair-who had been rather chummy before-suddenly came to blows.
“That was exciting,” she chuckled throatily as the Doctor extricated them from the melee and pulled her outside. “What?”
He’d been staring at her intently, with the sort of tense focus he usually reserved for ticking bombs, malfunctioning robots, and gun-toting soldiers. Yes, there was definitely something going on. There was a pale aura around her, an unearthly halo of nearly invisible light that was strangely familiar…
And then he met her eyes.
Still Rose’s eyes, yes, those unmistakable, beautiful, dark eyes. But there was something else moving beneath the surface, something wild and hungry and not quite human. Something that was looking fearlessly back at him, challenging him, urging him onwards.
“That lupine-wavelength haemovariform, the one after Queen Victoria-he didn’t give you a little nip, did he?”
“No,” she said with a slow smile. “Are you okay, Doctor? You seem a bit worried.” Her voice seemed huskier, rougher. The cadence of it struck a cord in the primitive recesses of his brain; his entire body broke out in goosepimples in response.
“You just don’t seem quite yourself tonight,” he said quickly. “Shall we head back?”
“Already? But it’s such a fantastic night.” She breathed in deeply, her chest rising in a way that made it impossible for him to look away. “This Irish air, that huge harvest moon. It’s like my blood’s singing. Like I can feel everything around me all at once.”
I can see everything... all that is... all that was... all that ever could be.
He blinked away the memory. He’d taken the power of the TARDIS, of the Vortex, from her so many months ago. He knew he had. But then why was she glowing like that in the close darkness? Why was he hearing the echoes of time and power beneath the words she spoke? How much had the Vortex changed her, at the cellular level, into something not yet Time Lord but not fully human, either?
Just how much of the Bad Wolf still lived within Rose Tyler?
“Let’s cut through the park,” she suggested, twisting her hair back into a half-hearted bun. She seized his hand before he could reply, and there was nothing to do but hang on and follow.
“D’you ever have those nights,” she said breathlessly as they half-ran through grass damp with dew. “Where you just feel the need to do something? Like you’ve got all this mad energy packed inside ya and you have to let it out or you’ll go loony?”
“Yes,” he said, his long coat fluttering behind them. “Frequently. Perhaps that’s why I natter on so much; flappin’ my gob rids me of all that excess excitement and lets me focus.”
“And here I thought it was ‘cause you’re so clever at the monologues,” Rose laughed.
“Welllll, that goes without saying,” he said modestly.
They had come to a tree-lined avenue that cut through the park. The huge walnut and oak trees stretched twisted arms over their heads, blocking out the moonlight entirely. The small path had the feel of a tunnel, and as the breeze died away they found themselves enclosed in dark silence. They both slowed their pace simultaneously, as if intimidated by the sudden closeness.
“Didja know you shimmer a little?”
The Doctor quickly glanced over at her in surprise. He could just make out her profile in the darkness, but only because she glowed faintly. And he could only see it because his senses were so much sharper than a human’s. So how did-
“It’s like you’re backlit, like some delicious dessert in a bakery window.” He could see her teeth flash white in the inky blackness. Something about it was slightly disconcerting.
“Are you calling me a pastry?”
“Mmm. Something spicy and exotic and exciting on the tongue,” she murmured in that husky voice that wasn’t quite her own, pressing closer. He found himself unconsciously inching backwards-and then his back was flush against the trunk of a tree. She reached up and undid her hair with one hand, letting it fall unchecked across her face and shoulders. With her dark eyes glittering behind such a screen (like a caged animal’s) he felt his heart leap fully into his throat.
“We should have gotten supper at that pub,” he heard himself saying around the lump. “If you’re that hungry.”
“I can’t help myself,” she said, her hands sliding up his arms. “I feel so… wild tonight. And when I look at you, I just want to... I’ve got all this energy inside, Doctor, and I just have to let it out.”
Her hands tightened around the lapels of his jacket and he almost staggered at the force of her tug. Their lips met, and there was nothing sweet or familiar about this kiss. It was like sticking a finger in a light socket, and the buzz of it echoed in his bones.
And then the universe exploded.
At least, it felt as if it had. Up and down ceased to exist, the planet hurtled backwards on its axis, and the Doctor felt a surge of power rush between them with enough force to raise the Titanic. The skin of her bare arms was incredibly hot under his hands, as if her body heat had abruptly tripled-it was far hotter than any human could withstand.
Then she had pulled away, so unexpectedly that his mouth was still curved to fit against hers. She laughed, that infectiously full-bodied laugh that did things to him, and then she was running down the tree-lined tunnel.
It took less than two-thirds of a second for him to leap into pursuit. As he ran, his long legs stretching out as far as he dared, his coat streaming behind him, he could hear the blood in his veins singing, harmonizing with the song coursing through her veins. He could actually hear the music stretching between their bodies, in perfect pitch and with a pounding rhythm that measured his pace.
She veered suddenly, breaking through the trees and sprinting through the tall, uncut grass of a field. Her unbound hair glittered in the flush moonlight, a beckoning pale banner he’d follow anywhere.
What was it about this mad human girl that made him act so irrationally? How could she make him feel like this, like an untamed animal? All it took was one kiss and the logical Doctor had become the Big, and very Bad, Wolf.
But as she spun around, that immense and toothy smile bright across her face, her eyes dark with passion and promise, he remembered that she was as much a wolf as he was, that she was no virginal and innocent Red Riding Hood. This realization was further enhanced when she abruptly pulled her pink shirt up over her head, tousling her hair madly as she tossed it aside.
Then she was throwing herself into his arms, and they were both falling to the dew-dampened ground. And as she straddled him, pulling at his jacket and shirt and sending buttons flying in every direction, he felt a kind of anticipation he had never fully experienced before.
From his eyebrows to his little toe, he wanted Rose Tyler. And judging by the way she was ripping apart his tie, she wanted him just as badly.
He slid his hands up her jean-clad hips, across the flushed skin of her stomach and back until he found the catch of her bra. There was a breathless moment of hasty fumbling and tugging before they’d managed to unhook the clasps, and then the straps had slid off her arms and it was incredible how perfect and golden she was, framed by the milky light of the harvest moon that hovered on her left shoulder.
It was difficult to undo the last necessary buttons when her teeth were grazing his neck like that. For what seemed like hours he could do little but struggle for dominance as she stole each breath from him just as he captured it. He would have growled if she wasn’t kissing him like that…
When he finally pinned her to the trampled ground she simply laughed, an unbridled laugh that was equal parts giddiness and happiness. He grinned in response and as she mumbled, “Cheeky monkey,” he slid his fingers into her hair, shifted his hips just enough, and turned her laughter into a sharp gasp.
When she gasped like that, moved like that beneath him, dug her nails into his arm like that, it was truly impossible to hold onto any sense of coherency. When he rocked within her like that, when his skin slid against hers, when the hearts within his chest thundered against hers like that, she could only bury her fingers in his hair and hold on.
They had become creatures of sensation. There was only the light of the moon and the cold droplets of dew and the rough texture of the grass against their legs and the glorious heat of the fire and electricity building between them. The song in their blood reached a crescendo just as they did, its final note and their voices melding into a single sky-splitting sound.
It was a wonder the grass around them wasn’t singed.
Not until he fell back panting did the world snap back into focus. And even then it all felt very remote and distant as Rose pressed against him, her hand at his stomach as she nuzzled his shoulder.
“Can’t bloody believe we just did that,” she murmured in his ear with a small, throaty chuckle.
“Me neither,” he said in a somewhat shell-shocked tone of voice. The music had faded away, his blood no longer felt afire, and the mad energy that had seized him was gone.
Well… He turned his head to look into Rose’s eyes. Not as wild as before, but still dark. Still bewitching.
…Perhaps it wasn’t entirely gone. Few things were ever entirely gone, even after they’d been taken away.
They watched An American Werewolf in London after they’d found the energy to walk back to the TARDIS. Halfway through it, Rose turned to the Doctor and said, “I keep feeling like I’ve forgotten something. Something important. It’s about wolves, I know that much.”
“They’re pack animals?” he suggested, twisting a strand of her hair around his finger. He pushed away the image of her facing down the Dalek Emperor, alight with the terrible power of the Vortex, tears of pain and sorrow staining her cheeks, as if doing so would save her from remembering it all.
She frowned in thought, turning back to the movie. A few minutes later she snapped her fingers suddenly, triumphantly. “Aha! They mate for life! That was it. I wonder if that’s true of werewolves, too?”
I am the Bad Wolf. I create myself…
The song that inspired the fic: Florence + the Machine's "Howl".
The Doctor took the power of the Time Vortex from Rose; but what if the Bad Wolf still lives within his companion? (A "sort of" companion piece to my fic something of the wolf.)
A fight broke out just as they finished their second drinks. Anything could have sparked it, but the Doctor had a strong suspicion that it was the way Rose was eating the cherries. The men sitting on the stools around them had been fixated on her from the moment she sat down, and it was just as she tied the second stem with her tongue that a pair-who had been rather chummy before-suddenly came to blows. 2,206 words
If you could only see the beast you've made of me
I held it in but now it seems you've set it running free
Screaming in the dark, I howl when we're apart
Drag my teeth across your chest to taste your beating heart
Now there's no holding back, I'm aching to attack
My blood is singing with your voice, I want to pour it out
The saints can't help me now, the ropes have been unbound
I hunt for you with bloodied feet across the hallowed ground
The Doctor had faced down any number of breath-taking situations, villains, and monsters. His life and the lives of entire planets had teetered on the brink of destruction. He’d seen wonders so beautiful they could blind with their dazzling splendor. He had run until his lungs felt ready to burst, until his legs were weak with exhaustion, until his very shoes were breaking at the seams. He’d tasted fear, burned with guilt, and his eyes had stung with bitter tears. Few in the universe could claim to have felt such a gamut of emotions, or to such a powerful extent.
Strange, how all of that seemed to pale in comparison to the surge of adrenaline and elation he felt when Rose turned to look at him like that, her eyes full of promise and her mouth curving into that tantalizing cherry-hued crescent he had memorized months ago.
“I feel wild tonight,” she announced, tossing the hair from her eyes. She stretched her arms over her head until the hem of her shirt rose just enough, and he felt his stomach tighten in response.
“Oh?” he managed to say nonchalantly, resisting the urge to lick his dry lips.
“I feel like a walk. Maybe a run.”
“A run?”
“Yeah. I suddenly feel like I need to move, y’know? Let’s go to the pub in town. I could really go for a martini right now. Or maybe a Bloody Mary.”
A fight broke out just as they finished their second drinks. Anything could have sparked it, but the Doctor had a strong suspicion that it was the way Rose was eating the cherries. The men sitting on the stools around them had been fixated on her from the moment she sat down, and it was just as she tied the second stem with her tongue that a pair-who had been rather chummy before-suddenly came to blows.
“That was exciting,” she chuckled throatily as the Doctor extricated them from the melee and pulled her outside. “What?”
He’d been staring at her intently, with the sort of tense focus he usually reserved for ticking bombs, malfunctioning robots, and gun-toting soldiers. Yes, there was definitely something going on. There was a pale aura around her, an unearthly halo of nearly invisible light that was strangely familiar…
And then he met her eyes.
Still Rose’s eyes, yes, those unmistakable, beautiful, dark eyes. But there was something else moving beneath the surface, something wild and hungry and not quite human. Something that was looking fearlessly back at him, challenging him, urging him onwards.
“That lupine-wavelength haemovariform, the one after Queen Victoria-he didn’t give you a little nip, did he?”
“No,” she said with a slow smile. “Are you okay, Doctor? You seem a bit worried.” Her voice seemed huskier, rougher. The cadence of it struck a cord in the primitive recesses of his brain; his entire body broke out in goosepimples in response.
“You just don’t seem quite yourself tonight,” he said quickly. “Shall we head back?”
“Already? But it’s such a fantastic night.” She breathed in deeply, her chest rising in a way that made it impossible for him to look away. “This Irish air, that huge harvest moon. It’s like my blood’s singing. Like I can feel everything around me all at once.”
I can see everything... all that is... all that was... all that ever could be.
He blinked away the memory. He’d taken the power of the TARDIS, of the Vortex, from her so many months ago. He knew he had. But then why was she glowing like that in the close darkness? Why was he hearing the echoes of time and power beneath the words she spoke? How much had the Vortex changed her, at the cellular level, into something not yet Time Lord but not fully human, either?
Just how much of the Bad Wolf still lived within Rose Tyler?
“Let’s cut through the park,” she suggested, twisting her hair back into a half-hearted bun. She seized his hand before he could reply, and there was nothing to do but hang on and follow.
“D’you ever have those nights,” she said breathlessly as they half-ran through grass damp with dew. “Where you just feel the need to do something? Like you’ve got all this mad energy packed inside ya and you have to let it out or you’ll go loony?”
“Yes,” he said, his long coat fluttering behind them. “Frequently. Perhaps that’s why I natter on so much; flappin’ my gob rids me of all that excess excitement and lets me focus.”
“And here I thought it was ‘cause you’re so clever at the monologues,” Rose laughed.
“Welllll, that goes without saying,” he said modestly.
They had come to a tree-lined avenue that cut through the park. The huge walnut and oak trees stretched twisted arms over their heads, blocking out the moonlight entirely. The small path had the feel of a tunnel, and as the breeze died away they found themselves enclosed in dark silence. They both slowed their pace simultaneously, as if intimidated by the sudden closeness.
“Didja know you shimmer a little?”
The Doctor quickly glanced over at her in surprise. He could just make out her profile in the darkness, but only because she glowed faintly. And he could only see it because his senses were so much sharper than a human’s. So how did-
“It’s like you’re backlit, like some delicious dessert in a bakery window.” He could see her teeth flash white in the inky blackness. Something about it was slightly disconcerting.
“Are you calling me a pastry?”
“Mmm. Something spicy and exotic and exciting on the tongue,” she murmured in that husky voice that wasn’t quite her own, pressing closer. He found himself unconsciously inching backwards-and then his back was flush against the trunk of a tree. She reached up and undid her hair with one hand, letting it fall unchecked across her face and shoulders. With her dark eyes glittering behind such a screen (like a caged animal’s) he felt his heart leap fully into his throat.
“We should have gotten supper at that pub,” he heard himself saying around the lump. “If you’re that hungry.”
“I can’t help myself,” she said, her hands sliding up his arms. “I feel so… wild tonight. And when I look at you, I just want to... I’ve got all this energy inside, Doctor, and I just have to let it out.”
Her hands tightened around the lapels of his jacket and he almost staggered at the force of her tug. Their lips met, and there was nothing sweet or familiar about this kiss. It was like sticking a finger in a light socket, and the buzz of it echoed in his bones.
And then the universe exploded.
At least, it felt as if it had. Up and down ceased to exist, the planet hurtled backwards on its axis, and the Doctor felt a surge of power rush between them with enough force to raise the Titanic. The skin of her bare arms was incredibly hot under his hands, as if her body heat had abruptly tripled-it was far hotter than any human could withstand.
Then she had pulled away, so unexpectedly that his mouth was still curved to fit against hers. She laughed, that infectiously full-bodied laugh that did things to him, and then she was running down the tree-lined tunnel.
It took less than two-thirds of a second for him to leap into pursuit. As he ran, his long legs stretching out as far as he dared, his coat streaming behind him, he could hear the blood in his veins singing, harmonizing with the song coursing through her veins. He could actually hear the music stretching between their bodies, in perfect pitch and with a pounding rhythm that measured his pace.
She veered suddenly, breaking through the trees and sprinting through the tall, uncut grass of a field. Her unbound hair glittered in the flush moonlight, a beckoning pale banner he’d follow anywhere.
What was it about this mad human girl that made him act so irrationally? How could she make him feel like this, like an untamed animal? All it took was one kiss and the logical Doctor had become the Big, and very Bad, Wolf.
But as she spun around, that immense and toothy smile bright across her face, her eyes dark with passion and promise, he remembered that she was as much a wolf as he was, that she was no virginal and innocent Red Riding Hood. This realization was further enhanced when she abruptly pulled her pink shirt up over her head, tousling her hair madly as she tossed it aside.
Then she was throwing herself into his arms, and they were both falling to the dew-dampened ground. And as she straddled him, pulling at his jacket and shirt and sending buttons flying in every direction, he felt a kind of anticipation he had never fully experienced before.
From his eyebrows to his little toe, he wanted Rose Tyler. And judging by the way she was ripping apart his tie, she wanted him just as badly.
He slid his hands up her jean-clad hips, across the flushed skin of her stomach and back until he found the catch of her bra. There was a breathless moment of hasty fumbling and tugging before they’d managed to unhook the clasps, and then the straps had slid off her arms and it was incredible how perfect and golden she was, framed by the milky light of the harvest moon that hovered on her left shoulder.
It was difficult to undo the last necessary buttons when her teeth were grazing his neck like that. For what seemed like hours he could do little but struggle for dominance as she stole each breath from him just as he captured it. He would have growled if she wasn’t kissing him like that…
When he finally pinned her to the trampled ground she simply laughed, an unbridled laugh that was equal parts giddiness and happiness. He grinned in response and as she mumbled, “Cheeky monkey,” he slid his fingers into her hair, shifted his hips just enough, and turned her laughter into a sharp gasp.
When she gasped like that, moved like that beneath him, dug her nails into his arm like that, it was truly impossible to hold onto any sense of coherency. When he rocked within her like that, when his skin slid against hers, when the hearts within his chest thundered against hers like that, she could only bury her fingers in his hair and hold on.
They had become creatures of sensation. There was only the light of the moon and the cold droplets of dew and the rough texture of the grass against their legs and the glorious heat of the fire and electricity building between them. The song in their blood reached a crescendo just as they did, its final note and their voices melding into a single sky-splitting sound.
It was a wonder the grass around them wasn’t singed.
Not until he fell back panting did the world snap back into focus. And even then it all felt very remote and distant as Rose pressed against him, her hand at his stomach as she nuzzled his shoulder.
“Can’t bloody believe we just did that,” she murmured in his ear with a small, throaty chuckle.
“Me neither,” he said in a somewhat shell-shocked tone of voice. The music had faded away, his blood no longer felt afire, and the mad energy that had seized him was gone.
Well… He turned his head to look into Rose’s eyes. Not as wild as before, but still dark. Still bewitching.
…Perhaps it wasn’t entirely gone. Few things were ever entirely gone, even after they’d been taken away.
They watched An American Werewolf in London after they’d found the energy to walk back to the TARDIS. Halfway through it, Rose turned to the Doctor and said, “I keep feeling like I’ve forgotten something. Something important. It’s about wolves, I know that much.”
“They’re pack animals?” he suggested, twisting a strand of her hair around his finger. He pushed away the image of her facing down the Dalek Emperor, alight with the terrible power of the Vortex, tears of pain and sorrow staining her cheeks, as if doing so would save her from remembering it all.
She frowned in thought, turning back to the movie. A few minutes later she snapped her fingers suddenly, triumphantly. “Aha! They mate for life! That was it. I wonder if that’s true of werewolves, too?”
I am the Bad Wolf. I create myself…
The song that inspired the fic: Florence + the Machine's "Howl".