Okay, this is the last update for now. I'm going through the rest of the story for nice chapter breaks... and the titles are killing me.

I hope you have enjoyed the story thus far. I'm off to work on an original story, and probably some more fics. Wish me luck. My new job is stressing, and I can't work on fics while I work.

Disclaimer: Don't own him, wish I did. Still has naked piccy though!

(The doctor goes domestic, but not for long, and vows to never again try to be domestic, because of the pain he feels at remembering this)

He didn't know why he hadn't thought of that in the first place. She had grown so used to him, and his life aboard the TARDIS that he was pretty sure she would prefer nothing else but his company. She was rather frightened of these people as well. If he just left her there, she wouldn't survive a week. They were given a small flat in the middle of the city. He had the TARDIS brought into the flat carefully so he might be able to fix it up while he tried to help her get used to a new life. And of course as a quick escape should anything go wrong.

There was a university nearby and the day after they had settled into the flat, they went to see if she was able to go to classes there, although her speech capacity was severely limited. She passed all the tests with flying colors, being a rather intelligent young woman, even for a fire being, who were apparently very intelligent on a whole. They even gave her some sort of personal computer pad to speak for her if she couldn't do it herself.

He was helping her to speak however slow it might be going. It was hard to teach a being such as her to speak, and most humanoids found it more difficult to learn language after adolescent years. The muscles forming were doing so slowly, but with that came great strides in words she could speak. She could read many foreign languages, but found it difficult to speak them, so he was intent on teaching her English, since when he was with her, she would understand all other languages through him, and the TARDIS.

The university was a strange start for her, she wouldn't go without him, and hated to be left alone with large groups of people. He took her there every day, and for a while even went in to classes with her to make sure she would be alright. The students there would laugh and tease her, but she either didn't understand that it was teasing, or she ignored it because she was much happier with him there protecting her. From what, he didn't know.

The day came when they felt she was ready to sit through her classes alone, and that he would only need to be there to walk her to and from her classes. Though he had no real idea what he was going to do in the mean time. It was a heart wrenching time for them both. The look of betrayal in her eyes hit him hard as they tried to dislodge her firm grip of his arm.

"Doctor! Doctor! Please! No safe, no safe here! Stay please!" She begged him, as they tore him from her grip.

"Please! This is no way to make her feel safe around you!" The Doctor scolded.

They stopped and looked at him, and she broke free of their grip and wrapped her arms about him tightly, sobbing silently as ever. He didn't like what they had to do; he was finding her to be a most wonderful companion. He felt that doing this was going to put a space between them they could never cross again. She looked at him with tear filled eyes, and a child like hope.

"I can't go in there with you Jade. They want you to be able to function without me here. They want you to stay." He said.

"Then you stay." She said quietly.

"I can't stay. The laws of my people stop me from interfering, and I can't stay in one place no more than you would be able to spout Shakespearian poetry right now. It's in me to wander the vastness of time and space." He said.

"Then I come with." She said.

"I can't ask that of you my dear. What I do, the trouble I find, is much too dangerous. I've had companions before, but they haven't suffered as you. You had no other option than to come with me, and I have no right to take you. Please, just give this place a chance. A few more weeks. I can stand it if you can." He said.

"Ok. Few more, no more. No like, me go with Doctor." She said.

"That's right. Then we'll try to find some of your people, and maybe find you a new place to live." He said.

"Yes." She said.

She looked back at the door, her fellow students laughing behind their hands at the apparent stupidity of a girl who sounded mentally handicapped when she spoke. It frustrated the Doctor, and he prayed that in a few weeks her attempts at speaking would find fruition in a most beautiful voice. That would show them to laugh. She was already dwarfing them when it came to studies.

She still looked scared, so the Doctor did something he never thought he would. He removed his scarf and placed it around her neck. It was very long, so he wrapped it a few times, stylishly. Then he kissed the top of her head the way a father might his ten year old daughter.

"There, you see? You've got something of mine, and I can't leave without it. I'll be here, waiting for you. It'll keep you warm when the weather gets cold, and you'll always have to think of me when you wear it, rather sorry about that." He said with a lopsided grin.

She looked up at him and laughed through the tears. He used a handkerchief in his pocket to wipe them away, handed her a few jelly babies, and she went into the classroom where the professor proceeded to scold the students about their teasing. He was letting them know how fragile one fire being could be without their tribe, and that they weren't used to speaking aloud. That was when the door shut, and all was silent in the hall. The Doctor was alone again. At least for the next fifty or so minutes. No matter, time was different for Time Lords.

So she wore his scarf over the next week and a half. He was glad it made her feel better, and he never told her that Madam Nostradamus had knit him a few, since it meant so much to her. As the weeks progressed she seemed to come further out of a shell he hadn't realized existed. She was so vibrant and happy when he saw her, and he was glad. The students still teased her about her lacking the real ability to speak like they did, and once she burst into flames from frustration in the middle of class. But other than that, she was a happy young woman.

The Doctor was beginning to fear that she was growing away from him, and he'd loose her. He never thought he'd be so attached to her since he was trying to get her ready to live on this planet without him. He just hadn't realized how much she had grown on him.

He woke up one morning feeling as if a storm was brewing. She was bustling around the kitchen in the flat, and greeted him in her happy way as he stepped out of the TARDIS. She was cooking food for them, mostly vegetables since he hadn't much need for a lot of meat in his diet, and she was vegetarian. He wondered if it was something about her people, or just a personal choice, since she'd be able to cook meat well enough on her own.

"Good morning to you as well, Jade." He said with a smile.

"Day seems strange. No good. No go school?" She said.

"No, I think it might be a storm coming. You're a fire being, and rainstorms probably wouldn't make you feel very good no doubt." The Doctor said.

"Sure?" She asked.

"I don't know really, but the people at the school would be very cross with me if I were to keep you from your classes just because we had a bad feeling. If it gets bad, just come back, I'll be here. I promised I'd protect you, and I'll do what I can." He said.

"Thank you Doctor." She said, hugging him.

"You're welcome Jade. Be careful out there. I don't want you hurt again." He said, wrapping his scarf around her neck.

She hugged him suddenly and placed a kiss on his cheek, then was out the door before he could react. He stood at the open door watching her take the path to the school, wondering when he had become so hopelessly domestic, like a father. Hoping that he wasn't sending her to something they would regret. He turned from the door trying to shake the bad feeling.