Fic: Entanglement
Title: Entanglement
Series: Matchmaker
Author: tardisblue
Beta: The wonderful wildwinterwitch along with my wonderful significant other.
Characters: Ten/Rose
Rating: T
Summary: Rose finds herself trapped underneath the Tardis console. Set after The Christmas Invasion.
Disclaimer: The BBC owns everything Doctor Who.
Author's Notes: A huge thank you to my beta wildwinterwitch for her support, encouragement and her superb beta-ing skills. A huge thank you also goes out to my significant other for his support.
“Can you see it?” Rose called out to the Doctor, wiggling a bright orange wire from underneath the Tardis console while lying flat on her back, a tangled mass of colourful wires dangling from above her.
“Yep! Got it! Now I’ve just to got to do a little adjustment here and a little tweak over there and voila!” exclaimed the Doctor, sounding slightly muffled.
Rose grinned to herself. They were nearly finished repairing the last of the Tardis damages, damages caused by the Doctor’s near disastrous crash landing from when he attempted to pilot the Tardis while still regenerating. Rose began to slide out from beneath the console and yelped as something painfully snagged her hair, pulling her back.
“Rose?” came the Doctor’s voice, sounding closer.
Rose tried again to slip out from under the console, but to no avail. Reaching up, she felt her hair, blindly trying to find what had caught her. She could find nothing but smooth, cool metal.
“I’ve gotten caught on something,” Rose called out, yanking futilely at her hair.
The Doctor’s face appeared near her feet as he crouched, peering in at her. “How did you get…” he trailed off as he took in her situation. Whipping out his glasses, he leant in, taking a closer look. “It almost looks like your hair’s been melded to the metal panel… But how did - Rose, did you feel anything strange when you were under there?”
“What? No, I don’t think so,” Rose said, tilting her head so that she could see the Doctor from where she was laying. She found that she quite liked the way the Doctor looked in his glasses. Her other Doctor wouldn’t have been caught dead wearing glasses, not to mention a brown, pinstriped suit. But this Doctor, she thought, looked good. Quite good.
“You’re sure?”
“What?” Rose asked, blinking, realizing that she had been blatantly staring at the Doctor. She hoped that he hadn’t noticed.
“Are you sure you didn’t feel anything strange under there?” the Doctor asked again, looking at her in concern. He squinted in concentration as he flicked on his sonic screwdriver, shining it scrupulously underneath the console.
“Yeah. Why?”
“Was afraid it might have been a Kryyxonian spider. But doesn’t look like there’s any sign of one. Or two. Or more,” the Doctor said looking relieved as he clicked off the screwdriver, rocking back on his heels.
Rose froze. “A what?”
“A Kryyxonian spider,” the Doctor beamed. “They’re native to the planet Kryyxon, a metal planet, quite fascinating creatures. They can actually fuse any type of solid element to a metal, which is why I thought that we had some underneath the console, looking at the way your hair seems to be fused to the panel. But then again, it takes days and days for the actual process to complete, so you couldn’t have gotten stuck because of the spiders unless you were lying there for days and days and days, not to mention the Tardis would have warned me, she’s meticulous that one, and she doesn’t quite like creepy crawlies - ”
Rose shuddered, interrupting the Doctor’s rather animated speech. “Can we get me out then? Sonic me out or something? Now?” The very idea of spiders scuttling about in her hair made her skin crawl.
“What? Oh yes. Of course. Hold up a minute!” the Doctor said, jumping to his feet and bounding off. He reappeared a moment later, holding a large pair of scissors and looking apologetic. “I’m afraid we’re going to have to cut you out. Sonic screwdriver wouldn’t do much good.”
Rose felt a quick stab of disappointment at the thought of cutting off a great chunk of her hair, but quickly remembered the Kryyxonian spiders. Better to get the hair cut off and get out from under the console in case there actually were those…those things crawling about.
“Yeah, okay. That’s fine. Just hurry, please,” Rose said, shifting gingerly.
“Now, there’s not a lot of room under here, but you should be out in a jiffy,” the Doctor said. He seemed to hesitate for a moment, licking his lips. Murmuring something that Rose couldn’t catch, the Doctor then squeezed his way underneath the console and carefully climbed atop Rose, reaching for the locks of fused hair.
Rose swallowed, all thoughts of Kryyxonian spiders gone from her mind, her heart beating erratically at the sudden compromising position they were in. While she had been attracted to the Doctor before he regenerated, Rose found that she was just as attracted, if not more so, to the Doctor now. She wondered what it would feel like to be in this position with the Doctor above her in another circumstance. His body pressed against hers, bare skin rubbing against her own, his arms around her, holding her close to him as they - No. Stop it, she told herself, squirming as a hot jolt of arousal shot through her core.
“Almost done?” Rose squeaked, trying to look anywhere but at the Doctor, a hot flush growing on her cheeks.
“Got it!” he crowed, almost a little too loudly.
As the Doctor began to extricate himself from under the console, Rose let out a sigh. She was unsure, though, whether it was a sigh of relief or a sigh of disappointment.
Suddenly, the Tardis lurched violently, launching the Doctor back upon Rose, the loose locks of her freshly cut hair flung out from the Doctor’s hand as he threw out his hands to brace himself above her. Their eyes locked and in that moment, time itself seemed to stop.
He was so close. So close that Rose could count each light freckle dusting his pale cheeks. So close that she could feel the hardness of his cool body pressed against her own. So close she could breathe in the warm, heady scent that was so irrevocably the Doctor, a scent that strangely enough, had not changed. She was lost, so lost in the heat of his dark gaze. He reached out, lightly caressing her cheek with his fingertips. Rose closed her eyes, revelling in the sensation. He was moving closer, so close she could feel his breath upon her face. His fingertips gently tilted back her chin. She took a shaky breath, hardly believing that his could be happening and then she -
- Promptly broke up into a coughing fit as she inhaled a good chunk of loose hair.
“Right!” the Doctor said, practically launching himself out from underneath the console, his ears burning a bright red, while he babbled about travelling back to Earth to get her hair properly fixed up.
Rose lay still, eyes wide as she stared at the colourful wires above her.
This was definitely going to be a whole new adventure.
-:-
She hummed to herself in satisfaction. Her carefully thought out plan had nearly been a success. It was only a matter of time before the two gave in. Kryyxonian spiders…as if she would ever let those creatures near her! She chortled to herself quietly. A whole new adventure, indeed!