Author's Note: For the Time Lord Tidbits Challenge. The tidbit was: Aspirin is incredibly toxic to Gallifreyans. The allergic reactions to aspirin cause a massive pulmonary and cerebral embolism severe enough to prevent regeneration. Even touching it can be dangerous. Had this sitting around for a while. No time like the present to submit it!

PLEASE READ THE ABOVE OR THE FIC WILL MAKE LITTLE SENSE! THANK YOU!

Many thanks to my betas, the wonderful silviaduchessa, jai-23, and my beloved ko-toni!

Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who.

Cure-All, End-All

The Doctor was sneezing. Rose though that a bit funny – not just a doctor sneezing, but the Doctor sneezing. She didn't want to mention it for two reasons: the first being he was a little embarrassed about it and kept trying to play it off as some sort of adventure-sensing seizure; and the second being that, admittedly, it was a little… cute. His sneezes weren't feminine exactly, just sort of delicate. This was mostly the cause for his embarrassment, which in turn was a deciding factor in what made it so cute, so for the Doctor sneezing was altogether a vicious circle.

She didn't say anything about it, and she certainly didn't ask. He would probably only make a barb about why she shouldn't fret over him, a silly little human, part of a race so prone to insignificant illnesses. That and she couldn't possibly imagine what he would say otherwise; the last time they'd visited anywhere remotely cold was two-and-a-half months ago, the snow dunes of Gley, and he'd been perfectly fine until a few days past. True, that was when they stopped by to visit Jackie and Mickey, but it was spring and there were no colds going around as far as Rose knew. She could attest fairly well, in fact, as Mickey was a waif when it came to sickness and fell ill at the slightest whisper the of the word "cough".

She didn't say anything about it and she didn't ask, at least until it stopped being cute. On the fourth day, it was becoming positively annoying. His sneezes were not the least bit gentle – they were monstrous and loud and put him in a fouler mood than most Cybermen could. Rose tried to be around him, tried to politely ignore it, but the sneezes were grating on the last of his nerves and he on the last of hers.

Rapidly reaching the extent of her patience, the thin thread of polite ignorance finally frayed beyond repair when he snapped at her one day, "For the last few days I haven't been able to smell my own nose-hairs, and your perfume is still giving me a headache!"

Rose crossed her arms, raised her chin, stood stubbornly beside the TARDIS. "Oi! It's not my fault the mighty Time Lord caught a cold!"

"I did not catch a… a… A…" His sentence was interrupted by a particularly violent sneeze. It sent him doubling over, hand gripping white-knuckled onto the TARDIS's central console. In response, the ship jerked and whined in a petulant manner, as if pleading Rose to end all their suffering.

"Fine," she muttered, pouting. Then she said louder, looking the Doctor square in the eye when he was standing straight again (though his glasses had fallen halfway out of his jacket, and to cover it up [as if she could miss a sneeze like that! they were now sitting crookedly on his nose), "What is it then? Space virus? TARDIS fever? What?"

He sniffled and looked exasperated to answer. "It's nothing. Doesn't matter. Leave it alone."

Rose huffed. "I would, but I'll never get any sleep at night with you sneezing like an elephant! People three-thousand years in the future can hear you!"

"There's nothing you can do!" he snapped. "Just let me figure it out!"

She rolled her eyes. "Typical! Fine, if you don't want my help, I'll stop offering it, you big nine-hundred-year-old baby. But in case you change your mind or God forbid get any worse, I've got aspirin in my room."

He sobered then – in fact, he fully blanched, until his face was pale white aside from the blossoming pink across his nose. "What?"

"Aspirin. You know, the cure-all of the universe?" Rose droned. She leaned off the console and began walking away. "But of course you're not sick."

He grabbed her by the elbow as she was walking past, and none too gently either. "You haveaspirin?"

Rose gave him a blank stare. "It's not illegal, but yeah, I've got some connections at the pharmacy. Took some sacrifices, but I know a guy. He made a few calls and –"

He cut across her in the middle of her dry sarcasm. "YOU HAVE ASPIRIN?" She winced; hearing the Doctor yell was never a good experience. Hearing him yell at her, over something as trivial as aspirin, however, was positively infuriating.

"Yes!" She shook him off. "Aspirin! Aspirin for people who say please, not for people who yell in my face!"

"Go get it!" He was shoving her toward the TARDIS hallway. "Go get it now!"

Rose was cross, surely, but after a year with the Doctor, she was half-used to him being ridiculous and unreasonable. There was no point wasting energy being angry; she just sighed and asked, "How many? I'll bring you a glass of water, or would you rather tea –"

"NO!" She turned to look at him, but couldn't stop as he kept pushing her along. "Don't take it out of the bottle! Don't even take it out of your bag! Just bring the whole thing here now!"

"What's got your –"

"NOW!"

The Doctor's company was foul, as was his grip, so she managed a gruff "fine" and marched down the hall. The TARDIS was getting tired of the Doctor as well, as Rose's room was suddenly the first on the left, whereas it was usually quite a walk. She threw the door open and grabbed the bag, closing the door just as noisily so as to voice her displeasure (and silently apologizing to the ship for being so rough). Then she re-entered the control room and all but threw the bag at him. To her surprise, he didn't catch it – he avoided it completely, darting quickly to the left; the bag landed crudely on the edge of the console and then dropped to the floor like a sack of potatoes.

"What is wrong with you?" she asked, incensed, as she picked up the bag.

"Gallifreyans are allergic to aspirin!" He had his tie loose around his neck and his shirt collar tugged over his nose. He spoke heatedly and muffled through the fabric – as if she'd known and was doing this on purpose! – and pointed to the door. "Throw it out!"

Rose was… Rose was several things. Surprised, for one, then inflamed that he'd want her to throw out a perfectly good bag (and all the perfectly new clothes in it) when the bottle would do just fine.

"Well, I didn't know!" She blew air out between pursed lips, nearly as annoyed as he, and dropped the bag beside the door. There, she withdrew a tiny, unsuspecting bottle of aspirin, opened the door, and chucked it out. "There, better?"

"The bag! Throw the bag out!"

She put her hands on her hips. "It was a gift from Mickey and unlike you he can't just magic money out of a machine! I'm not throwing it out!"

"Throw it out!"

"The aspirin is gone, I don't see why –" But she didn't get to finish the thought, only watched, mouth agape, as he ran over and kicked it through the open door. She saw it floating in space for a few moments, then he closed the doors and lowered the collar of his shirt.

"Deathly allergic, Rose! I could have sneezed out a heart!"

She glared. "Now you're just exaggerating!"

He looked at her steadily, evenly, angrily; his mouth opened and closed multiple times, but no sound came out. Finally, he turned and stalked back to the console, flicking switches.

"You better be taking us back to Earth!" she shouted. "You owe me a bag!"

"I'm having the TARDIS recycle the air!" he shot back. "So I won't keep you up tonight with my sneezing! DEATH IN A BOTTLE, ROSE!"

"Unbelievable! Absolutely unbelievable!" she grumbled icily, shouldering him as she walked past, heading for her room.

"Save the whole universe how many times, and you're done in by a little white pill – and it's not even the illegal kind!" She turned just once under the arc of the hallway, pointing accusingly at him. "And don't worry, I won't be getting any sleeping done! My pajamas were in that bag!"