"Tired?" the Doctor asked with a fond smile.

"Yep," you popped the p as you pulled the lever for the door. He walked to your side. You looked up at him, worn-out but smiling softly and then-

"Oh, wait," you held him in place with a hand to his chest as you reached up. "You have a leaf-"

You failed to notice you were almost completely pressed against him, but the Doctor didn't mind. Quite the contrary. He happily put an arm around your waist to steady you as he leaned down a little to help. You found the side of his head with your fingers and plucked the leaf out, but then-

"Your hair is so soft," you gasped in surprise and then carefully carded your fingers through it. "Oh my god..."

The Doctor chuckled a little, but as he looked down, he noticed how you were standing. A puff of laughter escaped him and got your attention.

"What?" you looked at him with a thoughtless arm around his shoulders. He pointedly looked down with a bright smile still on his face. You followed his gaze and-

You were standing on your tiptoes to reach him. Hm. "Well," you looked back up at his face, completely missing the mischevious glint in his eyes, "it's hardly my fault you're so ta-"

Before you even finished the sentence, he bent down, hooked a hand under your knees and scooped you up in a bridal carry.

You were in his arms. You were in. his. arms. His handsome-handsome-handsome face was close, so much closer than ever before, his arms were around you and you were pressed into his chest and god he smelled so nice, had he always smelled so nice? and there was heat in your cheeks and raging butterflies in your stomack and not a single. thought. in. your. head.

None.

You blinked a few times as your lips tried to form words, but nothing came out of your mouth. Your cheeks were a forest fire. You still had an arm around his shoulders, now gripping his jacket for support. What.

His eyes were so brown, warm deep brown, and they became darker around the pupil. You'd never noticed before. There were laughter lines at the corners and you wanted to caress his cheek, feel his skin under your palm. You wanted to run your fingers through his soft brown hair, mess it up and then put it right again. But most of all you would have given anything, anything, to have him closer.

"How's this for height?" he murmured, still smiling that adorable smile and you had no idea what to say. You had no idea how to produce sounds, let alone words.

You just stared at him, wide-eyed and breathless and goddamnit your cheeks were still red and your heart was beating like it was auditioning for a drum and you were never going to produce a coherent thought again, were you?

Let's face it, this was the best day of your life.

Because you looked at him, you just looked at him and your Doctor's eyes were so full of fondness they were bursting. It made a sun light up in your chest and you were suddenly full of light and full of love and you were happy, so so happy you could cry. You were dear to him.

And then, before you even had a chance to get on top of all that, he murmured "You're absolutely lovely when you blush." Soft. Fond. Full of wonder.

A squeak escaped your mouth as the heat in your cheeks intensified and the only thing you could do was hide your face in his shoulder. This man would be the death of you.

A few moments passed and you heard a small whisper, "Y/n?" But that was the sound of the Doctor, worried he'd done something wrong.

You would not have that, so you slowly spread your fingers and peeked from behind your hand. He was still as breathtaking as before, but he needed to know- "It's alright," you managed, voice soft. Your other hand was on his chest. Was it your imagination or could you really feel a double heartbeat under it?

He smiled in relief. "Oh."

You surprised yourself when you went on, "Doctor, l-" but the- the thing, the emotion, the earth-shattering truth wouldn't leave your mouth. He was looking at you, waiting for what you would say but you were...

You were helpless.

He was close, god, he was so so close, it drove you mad, your noses were almost touching and his lips- His lips. Suddenly the only thing that existed were his lips.

And there it was. The hunger. It spread like an awesome wave until it took you over, its inescapable maw swallowing you whole and you surged forward to catch his mouth with yours. He was soft and warm and his lips parted in surprise and the sweet taste of him under you made your head swim, so you pressed firme-

No!

You tore yourself away, suddenly very, very afraid. "I'm sorry, l didn't- Doctor, l'm so-" Words tumbled out of your mouth but before you could even properly look at him, his lips were on yours again, wonderfully insitent as he practically seized your mouth. You cradled his cheek and pulled him closer as he took your bottom lip between his, then he next kiss and the next, each more desparate than the other and he was there, he was finally there, warm and soft and real against you. When he bit your lip, you whimpered and the Doctor groaned as he chased after the sound.

You were breathless but still hungry when you finally had to part for air. You pressed your forehead against his, eyes still closed.

"Y/n," he whispered, so full of emotion you had to look at him. He smiled so it reached his brown eyes and you could finally, finally, cup his cheek like this, close and intimate.

You smiled back.

~

---

Donna tipped her head toward a sailor in uniform, her white, cotton skirt blowing against her knees. With a bit of whining and an unofficial sit-in protest, she’d convinced you to sport old nursing uniforms for the day. You couldn’t go to V-J Day in Times Square without looking the part. World War Two was finally over, and there were some very good looking, very eager military men looking for their gingery Florence Nightingale. Wrong war, the Doctor had grumped at this declaration. Whatever.

Her too-stiff shoes clacking against the street, Donna nudged your elbow. She flicked her nurse’s cap toward a sailor with an Old Hollywood smile. “Now, that one puts the boom in baby boom. I would gladly give him a physical.”

You managed to catch your giggle, hastily squashing it into a cough as the Doctor frowned at you. “One of the happiest celebrations in New York of all time, and you two are out on the prowl,” he griped. His lips pressed together into a tense line.

Donna watched as his gaze kept flicking toward you, trying to follow your eyes. His hand was tugging fitfully at the end of his sleeve, instead of finding some excuse to brush against yours. He looked like he’d remembered that he’d left all six of the TARDIS’s ovens on.

Eyes locked on the Doctor, Donna whistled and pushed you forward. “That one’s nice, isn’t he? Look at the arse on him. You could bounce a penny off that arse.”

“Oh, come on!” the Doctor protested. Was it just her imagination, or was he looking particularly agitated? His tie had untucked itself from his coat. It just flapped about his neck, like an angry cat’s tail. “His back’s not even to us!”

“’Oh, come on,’ you sound like my mother!” Donna shot back. “God knows I don’t need another one of her, thank you very much. Besides, Y/N’s fine with it. You big prude.”

The Doctor’s eyes darted to you. He was jealous. The Doctor—the Oncoming Storm, the Last of the Time Lords, Mr. I-Didn’t-Eat-the-Last-Biscuit-Would-You-Just-Drop-It?—was jealous. And it wasn’t a mild jealousy or a little pout, she could tell. Donna Noble understood the intricacies of the human/Time Lord/whatever psyche, and she could easily identify when a man was full-on brooding with jealousy. She’d seen it for herself a thousand times.

All right, all right. But the television programs were really in-depth. And if there was one thing she'd learnt from her favorite program, El Amor y Aventuras de Consuela Gonzalez, jealousy was a powerful force, revealing “la pasión” and sometimes triggering saber fights at dawn.

Thinking along those lines, minus the swordfighting, Donna asked, “Isn’t this where that famous kiss was photographed? Between a sailor and a nurse?”

The Doctor relaxed, glad to be back on a topic he could handle. “Yeah, it is. Alfred Eisenstaedt, ‘The Kiss.’ It’ll be featured in Time magazine in about a week, and everyone’ll go mad over it. It shows up in American pop culture for decades and decades.”

“And no one knows who they are,” you added, “at least not for sure.” You glanced around. “I wish we could find them and see for ourselves.”

I love it when a plan comes together. “Wouldn’t that be something if, say, one of us ended up being the nurse in the kiss? Creating a bit of history in a time loop-y thing?”

“All right, bit bored with all of this, aren’t you?” The Doctor grabbed one of your shoulders and began steering you back in the direction of the TARDIS. “A party’s a party, after all, nothing new to see here. Charles the Second, though, he could party. Let’s go meet him, shall we?”

Donna tucked her arm through yours, smirked to the high heavens, and winked at a businessman passing by.

---

When Donna had first met the Doctor, she thought she’d seen the full fury of a Time Lord. No matter how many times she’d seen that goofy grin, no matter how many people they saved on a near-daily basis, part of her would always remember him standing far above her, flames and water dancing in his dark eyes. Never before had she seen someone so empty, so merciless than in that moment.

Until a trip to the Selmar Nebula went horribly wrong.

Bruised and covered in sweat, she stood beside the Doctor in the TARDIS as it stood, locked, inside of a Kalhoonan war ship. She could hear the dull thuds of gunfire against the door, then the pounding of a battering ram trying to force its way into the TARDIS. She was still out of breath. You’d run, all three of you, lost in that maze of a ship you’d accidentally found yourselves exploring. The inhabitants had been stoic, harmless, until the Doctor had realized the ship had nuclear capabilities and was pointed at a peaceful would-be settlement. Donna was a little confused about the entire thing but understood the general gist: the strong and powerful preying on the meek and helpless once again. And then the three of you had been running, faster, trying to dismantle their system, up against an entire army of purple-veined soldiers. Somewhere along the sprint back to the TARDIS, you’d been ripped from them, lost. Now the Doctor was burning.

The Doctor held his sonic to the TARDIS console, glaring at the door. He’d made a connection with the warship’s speaker system, and a deadly calm head spread into the TARDIS as he’d told the captain exactly who he was dealing with, and what the man had so arrogantly, ignorantly done. Donna could hardly breathe, understanding for the first time what it actually meant to be worried out of her mind.

“And I can promise you one thing.” The Doctor’s voice was as dark and elusive as black hole, as sharp as cut ice. “If you harm her, if you so much as touch her again, I will come for you with a reckoning that your species will never forget.  I will split every single part of you, until you are devoid of every shred of honor, and your children’s children write of a time when the skies of Kalhoon went red. They’ll be too afraid to write my name in their records, but you--oh, you’ll join your history’s greatest regrets, unless you return her to me right now.”

The voice on the other side of the connection went silent. The Doctor’s hand gripped his screwdriver so tightly that his knuckles were white.  Donna found herself unable to move.

The doors of the TARDIS flew open, and you stumbled into the ship. You were limping. A gash in your trouser ran from your knee to your ankle. The Doctor dropped his sonic and met you at the entrance, pulling you to him and winding his fingers into your hair. “I am so sorry,” he whispered against you. “I am so, so sorry. Please don’t—I’m so sorry—“

“It’s all right,” you mumbled into his chest. “It’s all right, I’m all right. It’s okay.”

And for a moment, Donna wasn’t sure which one of you was comforting the other.

---

This morning, Donna had woken up a bit later than most adults would have found ‘acceptable.’ When she’d finally tumbled out of bed, she immediately wondered why the Doctor hadn’t burst in screaming about aliens, or dead historical figures, or fruit smoothies. The console room had been empty, and the TARDIS seemed to be floating aimlessly in space.  No one had been in the kitchen either, or your room, or that one room where a complex-looking machine made those big squishy pretzels.

Nibbling on a salted pretzel, Donna made her way down yet another hallway. She was definitely getting annoyed now. Had you left her and gone off on some mad trip?

Finally, she heard a murmuring as she approached the thick doors of the library. Softly, curiously, she peered inside. You and the Doctor were sitting together on a raggedy-looking leather sofa, a thick book in the Doctor’s hands. If she squinted, Donna could see that its pages were filled with odd circles that looked like the gears of a clock. The Doctor was reading aloud. Based on the odd burst of falsetto, it sounded like he was making up different voices for characters. You were listening intently, eyes flickering between the book and the Doctor’s face. You were close together, presumably with the excuse that you wanted to see the pages. Your shoulders and knees were brushing.

“Oh, yep,” Donna said to herself as she gripped the door, a bright gleam sparking in her eyes. “Poor saps’ve got it bad.”

Notes: So I hit 200 followers this past weekend (gosh thank y’all), and since I’d made a weird little rule for myself that I wouldn’t revise and post any of my old Matchmaker Donna stories until I hit some sort of personal milestone, I thought this one should be it!! It’s not really a series, they’re all one shots. I just love Donna Noble the most. The first DW fanfic I ever wrote, actually, was a Matchmaker Donna. And while this one here isn’t that first Matchmaker Donna story, it is chronologically the first within my loosey-goose fictional timeline. All that to say this fic feels weirdly special to me.

Notes: Very nearly called "Wireless Hot-Spot," but that would've been way too spicy out the gates, amIright? As is, we've got some intense, accidental, over-the-clothes action. Gotten quite bold, haven't I?

The conversation skipped a beat. Then you bit your lip, still smiling. “Would I be getting your second best bed,” you quipped, your voice dropping to match his, “or your very best?”

The Doctor stood up, his hand hitting the table, his chair scraping hard against the floor. The tables nearby fell silent. You and Shakespeare sprung away from each other. “Doctor?” Will asked, also rising to his feet.  “All right,” the Doctor said loudly, ignoring the question. His face had darkened, and his mouth was pulled into a painfully tight smile. “We’d best be off. So much of time and space, surprisingly little time. And not enough space. I’d say you know how it is, but you don’t. So great seeing you, have fun with your next decade-ish, parting is such sweet sorrow, all of that. Say hi to the wife and kids for us, whenever it is you actually see them. Good-bye.” Coat flapping, he stalked out of the tavern, leaving you to gape at where he’d been standing—looming—.5 seconds earlier. You pushed your chair back. “I’m so sorry. Let me just—” William Shakespeare watched, brow knitted in concern, as you chased after the Doctor. You burst out of the tavern, jogging to reach where the Doctor had finally stopped to wait for you. He was pacing, hands shoved into his coat pockets. When he heard your footsteps, he looked up. His lips were pressed into an impossibly thin line. Your cheeks were still flushed from the heat of the tavern, and your breath was visible in the cool autumn air. “What the hell was that?” “Me?” His voice rose to an incredulous pitch. “What the hell was all of that?” he asked, waving his finger between you and the bar. “I think that was you running out on us to sulk.” Your hands had made their way onto your hips, and your chin was jutting out stubbornly. He hated how much, even now, as frustrated as he was, he wanted to grasp your chin between his fingers and tilt your face up toward— The Doctor shook his head, his hair becoming even messier. “I’m brooding, not sulking, there’s a very pointed difference.” “Oh, honestly,” you snapped. “It was your idea to come here in the first place, and you’ve been acting childishly the entire night.” He huffed, jaw clenching and unclenching. “If I’d known you were going to become the founding president of the man’s fan club—” “You, what, wouldn’t have taken me to meet Shakespeare? The Shakespeare?” “Ugh, no,” he shoved his hands back deep into his pockets and tilted his head upward, as if trying to make long-suffering eye-contact with the universe. “Don’t inflect like that, you’ll only encourage him.” “He’s pretty much the greatest writer in the English language. He’s kind of allowed to be smug about it.” The Doctor’s gaze moved down to you. “But he’s not allowed to—” He broke off, chewing fitfully at the inside of his cheek. “Not allowed to what?” You stepped closer, you hand reaching out to gently touch his arm. The Doctor flinched, but his hand snaked upward to press against the back of your own. You wet your lips. “Doctor?” He watched you for a hard moment, eyes unable to leave yours, then finally opened his mouth to reply— “Doctor!” The Doctor’s face tensed at Shakespeare’s voice, eyes narrowing dangerously. “Oh, for God’s sake.” Shakespeare crossed the street. The man had one of the most expressive faces you’d ever seen. You’d noticed during his recitation, but it was even more apparent now, concern and guilt and apology written in deft strokes. He glanced at you before looking to the Doctor. “I misunderstood. Forgive the idle fancies of an unseeing man. “In my eagerness to impress and be impressed, even in our adventures this day, I did not pay your eyes any attention,” Shakespeare continued, slightly breathless in his sincerity. “I’d have known, then, and would not have spoken as I did. To come between you and your lady would bring no joy.” Shakespeare briefly lifted his hand to clasp where the Doctor’s hand was still pressed to yours. “May I not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments.” Automatically, eyes still on the Doctor’s face, you whispered, “Love is not love, which alters when it alteration finds, or bends with the remover to remove.” The Doctor’s face dropped from annoyed to blank, and you dropped your hand, regretting what you’d said immediately. The unspoken nearly spoken. You found yourself caught in his eyes, which were molten brown and burning with something you couldn’t identify and that scared you. Neither of you corrected Shakespeare. The verse hung in the air between you like the fog from your breath. The Bard looked thoughtful. “A fine phrase, my lady. Might I borrow it?” You jolted out of the Doctor’s stare. “Oh, shit.” “An even finer phrase.” A smirk pulled at the corner of his lips. “Am I to assume that the prior was my own?” You risked a glance at the Doctor. “The universe isn’t going to implode, right?” The Doctor’s eyes softened, and he inhaled. When he breathed out, his whole demeanor changed, becoming brighter, teasing. “One of the world’s most talented plagiarists. I’m sure the universe won’t mind being infringed on just a bit.” Shakespeare’s shoulders lifted. “Thank you, Doctor.” “Yeah, sorry about…” the Doctor trailed off. He stopped. He stuck out his hand for Shakespeare to shake. “You take care, Will Shakespeare.” Shakespeare ignored the Doctor’s hand and pulled him into a hug, thumping his back. “And you.” When he pulled back, the Doctor attempted an embarrassed smile. “Oh, we’ll be back.” He tilted his head toward you, sounding completely composed, and you wondered if he’d somehow erased the past five minutes. “This one’ll want to see the Scottish play. We’ll be there, front and center.” “The Scottish play?” Shakespeare repeated, his face brightening into a grin. “You are the master of intrigue, Doctor, and you play your game well.” “Not half as well as you play yours,” the Doctor replied. Shakespeare turned to you, lifted your hand, but didn’t kiss your knuckles. Instead he just held it with a friendly warmth. “Protect our Doctor, my dear lady. I fear there will be tempests waiting for you yet.” His eyes lightened. “But never have I met man or woman more capable, I think, than the one before me.” He released your hand, turning the motion into a slight bow. When he looked back up, he was wearing his signature half-crooked smile. “Until Fate unites us again.” You waved as the Bard strolled off down the streets of London, watching as Shakespeare turned a street corner and disappeared from sight. The Doctor began shuffling back toward where you’d parked the TARDIS. As you came closer to the blue box, he broke the silence, “All’s Well That Ends Well, I suppose.” The sheer cheesiness of the joke startled a laugh out of you. “Probably for the best. Would have been awkward to part on bad terms with the William Shakespeare.” The Doctor hummed in agreement, watching you from the corner of his eye. He nearly said your name, but he didn't know what he’d do after that. Confront you? Apologize to you? Lecture you? Pull you in close to him, your body flush to his and your eyes wide and bright in the dark-- You rapped your knuckles lightly on the TARDIS door and gently pulled the doors back as she unlocked for you. The Doctor looked back toward the road Shakespeare had disappeared down. “He’s one of the most brilliant, most talented men I’ve ever met.” You followed the Doctor’s gaze. Feeling just bold enough, you leaned forward and lifted to the tips of your toes to press a quick kiss to the Doctor’s cheek. You kept your voice nonchalant. “I’ve met cleverer.” You stepped into the TARDIS, stomach warm and clenched into knots, your hands a little shaky, Shakespeare’s sonnet still in your head. The Doctor lingered outside the TARDIS. “‘It is the star to every wandering bark,’” he breathed, “‘whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.’” The Doctor pressed his fingertips to his cheek, where the feeling of your lips still set his nerves on fire. He let himself grin, brushing off the doubt and insecurity and wariness and that constant ache, just for a moment. “Still got it.”

----

Notes: ALSO OLD AS DIRT. Cleaned it up a little bit so that I could post it here for the first time. Hopefully it still reads okay. I’m trying to alternate between new pieces and old Deviantart pieces--hopefully past readers (this sounds Grandiose but I know it’s like seven people, don’t worry, my head is a normal size) won’t get too bored. (seriously, though, everyone from Back in the Day who has reached out to me, I get really sentimental every time I get these messages, and I’m so so glad y’all are still here, thank you)

 A humanoid alien (you knew the Doctor hated it when you used that word, but he really did look he’d come straight from an Earth rave), with striking green hair and glowing eyes to match, held up a clipboard.  You took the Doctor’s hand and pulled him into the small group assembling at the front of the shop.

“My name is Ailbey,” the green-haired man was saying, “like ‘I’ll-be darned if this tour doesn’t send chills down your spine’—if you’ve got one, of course.” The Doctor snorted. You nudged him, but he nudged you right back, his bony elbow digging into yours. He didn’t pull away afterwards, just leaned into your side, and you relaxed against him.  

"I’ll be your tour guide today through Erosus’ largest petrified forest—the largest petrified forest in this galaxy, in fact. Today we’ve got a ten-person tour: a good, solid number! But I make eleven. I guess that makes you—” Ailbey pointed a sharp finger at Aucalis— “The odd one out! Just some humor for you. Best to balance out the chills with some old-fashioned laughter.”

Aucalis didn’t blink.

Ailbey adjusted his visor. “All right, uh, before we head out, let’s go around and introduce ourselves. Thanks to our state-of-the-art communications system, everything I say into this microphone will be automatically translated into your earpiece in the language selected upon your ticket purchase. I’ll act as a go-between for each of you. Ma’am, if you’d like to start us off—”

“Oh, don’t need that,” the Doctor piped up, his hands in his pockets.

“… Excuse me, sir?”

“Translation circuit from my ship,” the Doctor explained, as matter-of-factly as always. “It’ll cover everyone here. See?” he nodded to a group of teens—Marmoreans, probably, based on their glittering, marbled skin—who had lowered their earpieces upon realizing they could understand him.

“Well, then,” Ailbey straightened his headset. He didn’t repeat anyone’s intros, but he did keep the headset on, giving the Doctor a sideways look.

After everyone in the group had spoken, he clapped his hands. “Our tour is scheduled to be about two hours long, so hopefully you’ve stocked up on essentials in our Cursed Canteen. Remember that everyone will get one complimentary bottle of water or plasma globule, on us. Now who’s ready to get petrified?”

A human standing next to Aucalis, sporting a black t-shirt with a silhouette of Erosus that said ‘Paranormal Is My Normal,’ cheered. He waved around some sort of recording equipment, nearly hitting Aucalis’s spikes. She sidestepped him, looking deeply tired.

The group began piling into a black and green golf-cart bus, four rows of rubbery seats long. Ailbey positioned himself in the driver’s seat, and as he revved up the bus, a corny jingle—theremin and toy piano?—tinkled out of the speaker system. You climbed into the second row, between Aucalis and the Doctor. There was technically enough space for three people, but since the botanist had begun pulling out notebooks and sketches, you found yourself pressed against the Doctor, thigh to thigh, as the bus lurched down the road, away from the shop and toward Erosus’s stone forest.

“Remember, there are a couple of key rules to make sure our ghost tour doesn’t go bump in the night,” Ailbey chimed through the speakers. “First, please remember to keep arms, legs, and other appendages inside the tour bus at all times, unless instructed to exit for one of our Eerie Encounters. Second, always make sure to stay with a buddy! But remember that we’re a team today, and things can get pretty spooky, so stay within sight of the full group. Everyone must stay on the designated path anyway; it’s best for the forest if we stick to certain areas and disrupt as little of the ecosystem as possible.” You thought you heard Aucalis snort, but the loudspeakers began playing the jingle again.

“Hey,” the Doctor bumped your shoulder with a grin. “Wanna be my buddy, buddy?”

You gave an exaggerated wince, “Oh, this is awkward, Doc. I already told Maureen I’d be her buddy.” You turned to wave to an elderly alien with purple and blue skin, big blond hair, and bubblegum pink lipstick in the row behind you. As she waved back, eyes crinkling, her fuzzy mohair sweater—also a startling shade of pink—flapped in the wind.

The Doctor blinked, so owlishly that your mock-grimace almost cracked into a giggle. “Are you serious?”

Lowering your hand, you nodded. “She wants Frank and Gorm to bond.”

He scanned the tour bus in total bewilderment. “… Who are Frank and Gorm?”

“Maureen’s husband and grandson,” you answered. You adjusted your fanny pack, which wasn’t terribly comfortable to sit with. “They don’t see him often. He lives on Pirth.”

“When did you even learn all this?”

You shrugged. “Not my fault you didn’t listen to the group introductions.”

“Fourth and final rule,” Ailbey continued. You hushed the Doctor with a smug little grin that he couldn’t help but return. “Do not remove any natural object from the park, including—but not limited to—fossils and rocks; if you’d like to purchase a piece of authentic petrified tree, you’ll have plenty of time to do so after the tour, back at HQ.”  

“That’s the least they can ask us to do,” Aucalis said under her breath. The botanist was scribbling furiously into a notebook. “The fact that they’re available for purchase is already wildly disrespectful. Did you see how many trees they’d shattered for the gift shop?”

The tour bus rumbled off the paved road and onto a dirt one; the stone pillars—no, rougher, more organic, trees—that had loomed from the shop were now flanking the bus. As you rolled past, the sun broke through in flashes.

“Ashes, mudflows, and broken rock from the vicinity of the Athonian Range entombed the many trees that once thrived in this forest,” Ailbey narrated. Everyone who wasn’t on your row took rapid photographs as the trees blurred past. “As the volcanic matter cooled and cracked, the tree material soaked up water and silica from the rock, depositing that silica in each and every dead tree cell. Over a long time the trees decayed away entirely, leaving only the rock behind. This process is called petrification.

“Now, in most petrified forests, scientists have been able to collect enough data to determine what excavated the petrified trees from the material that surrounded them. But not here on Erosus—the truth is, what excavated the Erosus petrified forest remains unsolved. Wind? Water? Not as likely as you’d think, given the estimated time frame. Maybe, just maybe, these stone giants were unearthed by something far less… natural.”

You shot the Doctor a grin, highly entertained, and mouthed: “Ghosts.”

His eyebrows were up to his hairline, face contorted in a perpetual pre-snort. The tour bus hit a bump. You jolted forward, only to be tugged back by the Doctor’s hand on your shoulder—your far shoulder. You waited for him to withdraw, but he didn’t. Just wrapped his arm securely over your shoulders, steadying you as the bus chugged along.

“Bit rocky,” he said, answering your unasked question without making eye contact.

The warm, fluttery feeling in your chest kept bouncing along with the road.

Ailbey’s voice “Now this entire forest is protected by the revenue of tours like yours. So I’d like to take a moment to really thank you all for choosing to be here today; none of this could have happened without you.”

The tour bus slowed to a stop at a particularly impressive cluster of trees. “All right, gang, here we are. This is the site of our first Eerie Encounter; remember that we’ll have four of these spaced throughout the tour. You may exit the bus to get a closer look at our trees—don’t forget your buddy!”

You felt a tap on your shoulder. You and the Doctor both turned, his arm sliding. Maureen beamed at you. “All right there, sweet! Let’s have a little girl time and get away from our men.”

“Oh, he’s not my… man,” you replied, awkwardly, as she prodded you off the bus. The Doctor, trying not to sulk and only half-getting there, slid out of the seat. He helped you down by the hand, even though it was a grand two feet off the ground. Maureen giggled and, waving at the Doctor, tugged you into the clearing.

The Doctor turned to Aucalis, but she’d already partnered up with one of the three Marmoreans, who all looked wealthy, young, and a little uncertain. Probably traveling for their gap year. A human in his sixties was walking beside a child, probably about ten years old. He had bright blue hair and a generous spattering of purple freckles to match his violet-tipped ears. Guess that was Gorm.

One Marmorean—Archi? Maybe he should have listened to names—flashed the Doctor a knowing little grin as they passed. The guy in the t-shirt approached the Doctor, hands full. Seemed he’d been saddled with the group enthusiast. “Looks like we’re buddies,”

The Doctor looked him up and down, from the merch to the weird equipment—was that an EMF sensor? “Yeah, looks like.”

“I’m Corax.” Instead of offering a hand to shake, Corax just gave a practiced nod. 

“The Doctor.”

“Oh, cool, we’re doing titles,” Corax grinned. “Right on. Then I’m The Hunter.” He held up his recording gear like a weapon, which nearly sent a scanner toppling to the ground.

“No, that’s—” the Doctor shook his head, mouth scrunched tight. “Nah, never mind. That from the gift shop?”

“Oh, no, man. I’ve had this baby for at least three years. We’ve been to the Serien, Feronia, Traxarus—”

Over Corax’s shoulder, the Doctor watched you walk arm-in-arm with Maureen. You’d had to stoop a little, since she only came up to about your collarbone. You were chuckling at something as you helped her belong, a patch of sunlight brightening the colors of your hair.

“—We’re so gonna catch a ghost on tape. Erosus is one of the most haunted spots in the universe. D’you mind holding this?”

An infrared sensor was dumped into the Doctor’s hands.

The forest was so quiet that you could hear each and every footstep in the clearing. Rare patches of grass crinkled underneath your boots. Around the bases of each petrified tree, green faded to brown, until each was surrounded by a circle of dry earth. You craned your head upwards, tracing the silhouette of an enormous trunk; branchless, it rose into the sky, one gnarled column. The bark—not bark, you supposed, but rock—was thick and jagged, a blend of colors. Greys, tans, stark patches of amber. The length of the tree stopped abruptly, at about twelve, thirteen feet. There was no canopy to block out the sun. Each tree broke off in sharp, geometrical crags that cast uneven shadows.

 Ailbey’s voice punctuated the hush that had fallen over your group. “You might have noticed that silence settles quickly over the forest. That’s because our team has discovered that there’s little to no animal life: another of Erosus’s great mysteries. Perhaps it’s because, as many planets and cultures have long believed, animals are frightened away by spectral entities.”

One of the Marmoreans—the tallest one, Morten—was ignoring Ailbey’s speech, which had moved on to the soil. You couldn’t blame them, half of the group was tuning him out. Even Corax seemed more focused on filming. Morten stood in the shade of a massive tree stump while their friends chatted and took a selfie nearby. Morten was looking intently at something in their ivory-and-silver swirled palm. Something dark and rugged.

Then the skin of their palm stripped upward around the shape, as if peeled back. You blinked, trying to process the sight of their skin—a piece of their skin—hanging in the air, strangely bloodless, as Morten’s eyes widened. Their whole body seemed to shudder, to vibrate. Their lips parted, as if they were about to speak, when suddenly their flesh sunk into the shadows, completely shrouded from sight.

A skeleton fell from the darkness and clattered to the ground.

Dromeda screamed. The sound shattered the forest. Their skin, marbled pinks and golds, glowed in the sunset as they collapsed to the forest floor, kicking up dust, screaming and screaming and—

Reflexively, you stepped forward toward them, but the Doctor’s arm caught you. He’d moved, you hadn’t seen when, but he’d rushed over to you and pulled you into his chest just as you were about to cross into the shady patch that held what was left of Morten.

“Don’t move,” he ordered into your hair. Louder, to the group, he said, “Nobody move. Do you hear me?”

You couldn’t tear your eyes away from the bones—slenderer than a human skeleton, tinted silver, but real bones. “Doctor, what happened to them?”

“Look at the trees, the position of the sun,” the Doctor replied, scanning the sky. You couldn’t follow his gaze. He pointed. “That shadow, that one right there over Morten—it’s longer than the others.” He traced the shadow. “But there’s no tree casting it.”

Dromeda’s screams had quieted as the Doctor spoke, their eyes unblinking. Behind his camera, still shakily pointed at Morten’s body, Corax breathed out, “That’s messed up, that is so freakin’ messed up, man—”

“Everybody stay calm!” Ailbey shouted. “Everybody just stay calm!”

You twisted to look up at the Doctor. “What is it?”

“Vashta Nerada,” the Doctor’s voice was low, full of that unnatural calm that only happened when things were really, really bad. His arm tightened around you. The petrified trees towered over you, blocking the sun in thick stripes that stretched across the clearing. “Stay out of the shadows.”

Notes: Y’all WHAT IS THIS. How did this become a three parter?? What pacing is this?? 

I just really, really wanted to do something that felt challenging with the Vashta Nerada. I wanted it to feel similar to Silence in the Library/FoD without just plopping them in The Library again. So I got a little wrapped up in the setting and made this monster. With some ecotourism commentary I guess. And the most self-indulgent build-up possible. I just. What is quarantine, man. 

Pls be patient with my self-indulgent ThiccFic (a phrase I’ve never used before, and hopefully never will again). I promise fluff, angst, and even more fluff to come in parts two and three. Let me know what you think! Let me know what you f e e l! Let me know if you think I should just Stop Here, Who Is This For? 

Your favorite sofa in the library was a leather one, worn out and crinkled like someone had beaten it half to death, tucked back near the O-P section in the Fiction wing. Once settled on it, the Doctor pulled you closer to him, his arm wrapped around your shoulder. His fingers absentmindedly stroked your upper arm.

You held up the book that had been waiting on the end table, turned to the Doctor, and made The Face.

The Doctor eyed you suspiciously. "What's with the big eyes, Big Eyes?"

"We're at chapter fourteen," you said matter-of-factly, and handed him the book.

"Yes, and it's your turn to read."

You pouted, lower lip momentarily distracting him. With a happy easiness, he leaned over and nipped at it.

He loved that he could, loved that he could do it without hesitation or guilt, and loved when you immediately responded by curling further into him and turning his teasing into a proper kiss, your hand fisting into the fabric of his shirt.

You broke away, and he was left grinning at how breathless you were. Your hair was slightly frizzier, and you didn't seem to notice you were half on his lap now, even though he very much did.

"Chapter fourteen," you repeated, and he buried his face in your neck in response.

"You are persistent," he mumbled against your skin.

"We're at the very best part."

"Remind me why we're reading a book we've both read before?"

"To bicker about it, mostly."

"Mm."

You nuzzled him and tried to sound as persuasive as possible. "If you read, you can play with my hair." He snorted, his breath fanning across your neck. "Sounds like you're the one getting the most out of this situation." "Like you're going to say no." The Doctor drew back. He met your ‘innocent’ eyes with a soft smirk. "Rather presumptive aren't we?" You grinned. "Here." The book was already opened to the page you'd left off on.

He gave a dramatic sigh as you slid back onto the sofa beside him, resting your head on his chest. His arm returned to its spot across your shoulders, his hand raised to curl into your hair.

"You'll do the voices?"

"Who do you even take me for?"

You kissed his collarbone through his shirt, humming happily.

He'd only finished reading the first page (silly voices and all) before you interrupted him. "Thank you. For today."

He glanced down at you, eyebrows raised behind his glasses. "’Course."

You answered the unasked question. "You're not usually one for lazy days. And compared to saving a planet or climbing, I don't know, the Gorgathian Himalayas--"

He leaned his head back, a laugh catching in his throat. "Did you just make up a planet?"

"--this seems a little mundane,” you finished. "But I really, really loved it."

The Doctor hummed, ghosting his lips over your hair. “Mundane. I quite like mundane from time to time.”

The truth was, of course, that mundane usually hurt. That domesticity reminded him of what he once lost, what he always, always lost. It was the normal, quiet moments that made it hurt to breathe. 

You turned your face up toward him with that beautiful smile, his smile, the one that he liked to think you saved for him, and he felt a grin playing at his lips, felt his chest tighten and then grow very airy.

Sometimes, though, he liked mundane quite a lot.

Notes: I was right in DOUBTING MYSELF: revised old fluff-piece did end up here before the VN request (to that sweet anon, I promise, I am getting on it. I just ended up getting invested. And that’s a good thing, right?? Hopefully some fluff is good. It’s raining here, which makes for an A+ fluff day. Also, spoiler: the above fic would definitely end up with a library make-out sesh and burnt brownies. I don’t know what to tell you, making out in the TARDIS library is just a mood. There will inevitably be a lot of library make-outs on this blog. I am nothing if not consistently Ready to Kiss in a Library. 

The Doctor cleared his throat and spoke low enough to just address you. “That person I lost? The one that might’ve been important?” The Doctor was still facing forward, leaving you to imagine his facial expression. Was he frowning? Wincing? Earnest? “Don’t want that happening again. So don’t you dare go into a shadow, Y/N, do you hear me? No matter what happens, you stay in the light.” His grip was white knuckled around his sonic. “That’s an order this time.”

You swallowed. “Don’t worry, Doctor. I’m following you, aren’t I?”

He started to reply—you could tell by the way his head tilted back. But then he held up a hand, and you stopped just before your foot crossed into his shadow. “Nobody move,” he commanded, and the group went silent. You peered around the Doctor.

The shadow of a large tree loomed ahead. It stretched onto the grass, a dark twin, trunk and branches twisting across the dirt. It looked… swollen, every edge inching outward. Gnarled, pitch black. Bloated. You traced up the shadowy trunk to the base of the tree that cast it: a bare, a column of stone. Petrified trees didn’t have branches. The silhouette pulsed, growing shadowy twigs and leaves that swayed in a wind that wasn’t there.

The branches broke, and a dozen shadows dispersed.

The Doctor reached back and grabbed your hand, shouted for you to run. You could hear the others panting, some yelling, their footfalls pounding against dead grass and dirt. The Doctor pulled you forward. You sprinted through the trees, not really knowing where.

A red shape caught your eye—a rectangle—a building, and you tugged the Doctor toward it. He rerouted without hesitation. It was a shack, you realized as you neared it: bright red, barely bigger than the trees around it. You wrenched the door open as you and the Doctor crashed in. He yanked down the overhead light, as if he’d known it would be there. It flickered.

“Come on,” he grunted. “Come on.”

A fluorescent glow lit up the room. Without thinking, you slammed the door shut behind you.

In the breathlessness that followed, you both watched the door. A strip of shadow trickled at its base, creeping under the crack.

The Doctor’s sonic lit up, and his mouth hardened. “It’s them, but they’re weak. The swarm scattered so it could spread out further, but their power’s in numbers. It’ll take them longer to get through the light this way. We’ve got some time.”

Time for what? You’d have to cross the shadow to open the door, you thought. Then it’d be too late.

“What is this place?” you asked, hands on your knees as you caught your breath. The space was small, cluttered with crates and loose paper. You were up to your ankles in dust.

The Doctor looked around. He brushed a cobweb off a nearby box. “Looks like a storage shed, from the tours. Maybe a first-aid hut.”

“Super useful,” you mumbled. “Don’t they know the ghost tour essentials? A big torch? Pretzels? A flamethrower?”

He laughed, almost begrudgingly. “Nah, looks like they’re all out. But I think we’ve got enough lanyards to host the galaxy’s second-worst IT convention.”

You sunk onto the concrete floor. “How are they even here? The Vashta Nerada, I mean.” You leaned against one of the crates. You felt grime settle on your shoulders, but you were too tired to move. “Aucalis said they hatched from living trees, and all the trees are dead. They’ve been dead.”

“Just a few hundred years ago, there were living trees here,” the Doctor replied, his eyes still on the doorway.

“And, what? The ghosts of the Vashta Nerada are back for blood?”

He concentrated, ran a hand through his hair as he joined you on the ground. “No, but they were in those trees—at least, their ancestors were. They’re what excavated the forest. Wasn’t ghosts at all, course it wasn’t. It was the Vashta Nerada, generations of them still living under all of that—that volcanic matter, that fossilized build-up. Trapped underneath, unable to die.” He leaned back against the wall. “So they eat their way out, slowly, over centuries, numbers growing, exposing the petrified trees. They adapt to living in the stone, and once they break out, they do what the Vashta Nerada always do. They linger in the shadows, feeding on small things alone in the dark.

“But they’ve become hostile, attacking a full group,” he frowned. “But why now? Why are they aggressive now, what’s changed?”

You straightened. “The ghost tours,” you breathed. “The tours at sunset, the souvenirs—”

“—so they’re on the defensive; their homes have been chipped away, bit by bit,” the Doctor scowled at the crates, all plastered with the tour logo. “For a cash grab.”

“Morten, right before they—” you broke off, swallowed, tried again. “I saw them, they were holding something. I think it was a piece of tree.”

“That’s it, then. Counterattack.”  

You thought you heard a scratching noise, like dozens of little nails against the walls. Something muffled, like a yell. You took a deep breath. That’s not how they worked, they didn’t make a sound. Breathe.

The darkness inside the room stretched a little further. The Doctor had closed his eyes. He had stopped, you realized. There was a bent to his shoulders that you hadn’t seen before. He’d tried, you thought, to come up with a clever idea to escape. And he’d stopped.

You swallowed, watching the shadow grow toward you both. “Will it be fast?”

“Yes.” The Doctor exhaled. There was relief in his voice, like he was glad he didn’t have to say it, that you were about to die; but there was a tightness too, like hearing you say the words hurt worse than you could imagine. “Yeah, it should be.”

“Okay,” you nodded. You rewet your lips. “Okay then.”

Your eyes were watering—not really crying, just passively wet. You felt something desperate crawl in your chest, something anxious and hysteric. You spoke over it. “I, uh, didn’t picture it like this. There was definitely less being-eaten in my version. I don’t know. I, I guess I thought I’d be brave when it happened.” You laughed. It cracked. “And honestly, I thought you’d kiss me once. You kiss everybody—everybody, all the time. Really thought you’d lay one on me before I died.” You joked, smile weak.

“I always want to kiss you.”

You went still, somehow stiller than you’d been since Morten’s body had been wrapped in shadows.

“Not much point in dancing around it now, is there?” A crooked smile crept its way onto the Doctor’s face, head tilted back as he kept his eyes on the ceiling. Almost as if he was afraid to look at you.

“I wanted you to kiss me. From day one. You—” his eyes finally met yours. They sparked like flint in the low light, intense enough to burn. You wiped your face and looked down. A giggle—muffled, but real—bubbled into your sleeve. “You took my hand, asked me if I’d ever been to Saturn, and if I fancied ice skating on its rings in the year 3045. Right in the middle of an alien invasion. And I wanted you to kiss me.”

His Adam’s apple bobbed, but his eyes were still unearthly and scorching. “Maybe I should have.”

You were hyperaware of how close he was and wasn’t—not close enough to touch, just barely too far away for that. But close enough to hear his breathing. He watched you watch him. You started to move, to get that bit closer. You’d been aware of your body all day, but this was nothing like that; this was warm, a breathless sort of tension that prickled the hairs on the back of your neck as he slid toward you, that pooled in your stomach as he lifted his hand to cup your cheek, something desperate and final—

The door swung back, and a camera protruded into the doorway. “I found them!”

The shadow at the front of the door shattered as light poured in, dispersing into the corners of the shack. He didn’t have to think; the Doctor shot up, grabbing your hand, and pulled you outside in one rapid burst. You barreled out of the shack, its temporary safety and its threat, and found yourself back under the ruddy sky.

Corax barely managed to leap out of your way, juggling his camera. “Hey there, buddy!” he cheered. “I knew you’d make it!”

The Doctor laughed, a bright, head-thrown-back laugh. You were back in a circle of light. “I am so honestly, truly glad to see you, Corax.”

“The Hunter’s always looking out for his pack, man,” Corax grinned.

“Mm,” the Doctor exhaled, still managing a grin. “Still mostly glad to see you.”

You scanned the trees as the Doctor scanned your shadow, just in case, relief lighting up his face. “Where’s everyone else?” you asked.

“We haven’t found any others!” Aucalis—that was Aucalis. She and Archi were huddled together in a strip of sunlight, just a few yards away. Aucalis called out again, hands cupped around her mouth. “We have to move forward! We’ve only got about half an hour until the sun’s fully set!”

You shook your head, circling to search the area. “No, no way. We just need to call them toward us. It’s so quiet, they’re bound to hear us.”

“We’ve been yelling this whole time,” Corax told you, and his tone felt uncharacteristically gentle. “No one’s answered.”

“We have to move!” Aucalis repeated. Her face had crumpled. “Please, we have to go, now!”

You faced the Doctor. You waited for him to protest. He wasn’t looking around, just at you, the corners of his mouth tugged down. That hollow look was back in his eyes. Shaking your head, you dropped his hand. “No, Doctor, come on. We can’t just leave them—” A crack split the air. The Doctor’s eyes widened, stare trained over your shoulder.

Your heart in your throat, you turned.

An enormous petrified tree, its ragged trunk stretching into the umber sky, moved—pulsated, as if the stone was breathing. Out, in. It was split down the middle, crumbling outward, a hole bleeding pebbles and dust. Out, in. The fissure shivered, the stone fluid and shuddering. It rippled.

Crack.

Crashing onto the forest floor, the tree split in half, collapsed on itself. Jagged rocks rained into the air. You shielded your face, a cough ripping through you. Dust coated your tongue.

When you opened your eyes, blinking through the debris, you saw dozens of shadows, black and coiling, oozing from the fallen trunk. You shouted the Doctor’s name. You were drowned out by the sound—the awful, shattering sound—of other trees.

The shadows that pooled on the grass thrummed. They rose and shot out, reaching, devouring.

Blindly, alone, you ran into the dark.

Notes: Two chapters in one week, y’all! Two spooks for the price of one! That’s the only merit of over-writing and having a dumbass’s sense of pacing. AND THE FLUFF. We reached some fluff!! A brief lil beacon of it. 

I hoped you liked it, and the rest. I’m loving y’all’s comments so much; they really do motivate me to keep on with this big ole thing, it’s super super encouraging. I know I’m behind on replying to pt. II comments, but please let me know what you think of part III even as I’m catching up!! As always, I hope y’all are well. ❤️