Author's Note: Well, this was inspired by a post reblogged on Tumblr by the lovely perfectlyrose from theapplepielifestyle with AU prompts. This one is the ever popular 'Had a bit too much to drink and woke up in a stranger's flat' framed by this specific prompt: 'I met you last night when you were drunkenly patting my dog in my backyard at 3 in the morning and when I asked you what you were doing you slurred something about dogs being great and then you threw up on my feet and then fifteen minutes later you were passed out on my couch so that's why you're here right now also what the **** is your name and why were you patting a dog in a stranger's backyard in the middle of the night' au. It was a little Nine/Rose AU writing exercise for myself this weekend. I, of course, also mapped out a whole headcanon history around it as well (because I can never do anything simply), so those bits and pieces might find their way up later on. But for now, it's just this! And it was fun to write! Also, the visual of Nine's dog was inspired by a lovely drawing by clumsypumpkin, who makes amazing art you should go check out immediately.

Rose slowly began to drift back to a very painful consciousness, squeezing her eyes tight against the insistent light currently was pouring in from somewhere very rude. As her faculties began to drag themselves together (across what felt like a minefield littered with broken glass and her brother's LEGO's), she realized several things:

One - she was very, very hungover. Which meant that last night she must have been very, very drunk.

Bollocks.

Two - The soft surface on which she was currently horizontal didn't look, smell, or feel like anything in her flat.

Double bollocks.

Three - There was a very warm, living, breathing being clamped under her right arm.

Triple...oh, wait.

Well, that was curious. Rose carefully cracked open an eye to confirm what her fingertips had, rather belatedly, conveyed to her brain.

The living object under her arm was a dog. A very large dog, actually.

She was hungover, on a strange sofa, and she was spooning a dog.

Triple bollocks, after all.

Dear lord, what had she done last night?

Groaning loudly, Rose slowly sat up, knocking off the blanket that had been placed over her and fighting off a wave of nausea that threatened to overtake her. She immediately closed her eyes, pressing the heels of her hands into her skull with her elbows on her knees. Once the most dangerous bit of dizziness seemed to have passed by, she braved opening her eyes once more. Her gaze first slid to the left, where she found herself almost literally nose to nose with her (apparent) bedfellow.

It was a very large dog (a German Shepherd/Doberman cross, if she were to hazard a guess), with very large ears and beautiful blue eyes. His right ear seemed rather worse for wear, ragged and scoured, along with some other scarring on that side of his body, but the wounds looked old and well-healed and his black and brown coat was gorgeous. Disturbed by her movement, apparently, he had slid off the couch and was now perched on the floor right next to her, tail thumping against the leather, head tilted slightly to the side as he watched her with bright, happy eyes.

"Well, s'pose I should introduce myself," Rose mumbled, reaching out toward him tentatively and letting him sniff her hand. He did so, joyfully, and then stuck his head under the outstretched limb and jerked it until she laughed and began petting him in earnest. "I'm Rose. And you know, you're more friendly than most blokes I've ever heard of on a morning after."

The speed of the tail-thumping increased at the sound of her voice and her smile widened despite the punk drummer currently testing out his cymbals inside her skull. She scratched him behind the ears and closed her eyes again. The more she focused on the feel of his soft fur under her fingers, the less her throbbing head bothered her. However, try as she might, she couldn't come up with any recollection of the previous evening.

"Never done this before, but I think now I'm supposed to find the rest of my kit and awkwardly stumble out the door, yeah? Call a cab, do the walk of shame, hope that I never run into you at the corner store?" She let out a weak laugh. Served her right for trying to keep up with Shareen and Keisha after being away for a year.

Once she thought she'd mustered up enough equilibrium to stand, she gave the friendly dog one last pat. "Well, uh, thanks for a great night!" she said, trying for humour once again, wrenching herself up off the couch.

"Don't I get any thanks? I'm the one who carried you in," came an amused-sounding drawl from nearby.

The voice startled her enough that Rose lost what little balance she'd conjured up from the fairytale land where vodka didn't exist and she wasn't currently mentally swearing at Shareen in two different languages. She began to topple to the ground only to be caught by two large hands, which helped her back down to the couch.

"You have really big hands, you know that? Seriously though! They're, like, as big as my face! Shareen always says she likes men with big hands. Ooop, shouldn't have said that. Sounds dirty. But I'm not hitting on you, I swear! Even if you are my type. Anyway, how did your hands get so big?"

Rose flinched as that memory flitted across her inner eye before dancing away. Maybe she would get lucky and she'd just made that up.

Taking comfort in the warm, solid form of her new best buddy who immediately pressed against her leg once again and also taking a deep breath, Rose bravely looked up at the speaker. He was seated in a comfy-looking armchair a little less than a meter away and was watching her with amused, dancing blue eyes and a wry little grin.

Rose felt her blush begin at the soles of her feet and creep up through her entire body as she looked him over. He looked like he was in his mid-thirties, fit and lithe with an athletic build, close-cropped dark hair, a plain green jumper and a pair of beat-up black jeans that really showed off his physique.

Oooh, she probably shouldn't be thinking that right now.

But, he was older, he was gorgeous, and he was just a little bit dangerous looking.

Well, Drunk Rose had been completely right there. Spot on her type, then.

Rose slid her gaze away from him and, to keep herself from eyeing him up again, she turned her attention back to the dog at her side. Who also had rather large ears, short, dark fur and bright blue eyes. She giggled to herself.

"What?" he asked, rather petulantly, and oh, he had an accent, too. Manchester, from the sound of him.

No wonder she'd followed him home.

She probably would've followed him anywhere. Like a puppy. That thought made her irrationally giggle again, the tension of the situation and the absurdity of everything crashing down on her suddenly until she was clutching her sides in laughter.

"What?" he repeated. "What is it?"

"Nothing," she gasped, wiping tears. "Can you fill me in on last night, by chance? I don't seem to remember anything."

"Not surprising," he snorted and his hand moved closer again, this time to hold out the bottle of paracetamol and the tall glass of water that had been sitting on the end table, which she accepted greedily with a thanks. "You were completely pissed."

"Yeah, gathered that," Rose replied, gulping down the pills and the entire glass of water, feeling much more human. "How'd I end up here? Actually, where is here, exactly?"

"Bayswater," he answered. "And how should I know how you got here? One minute I'm minding my own business, letting Jack out at half two in the morning and the next thing I know, there's a blitzed blonde who won't leave sprawled out on my sidewalk, trying to talk my dog's one good ear clean off."

"So you decided you should carry a completely soused stranger into your flat for the night?" Rose replied, deciding to hand his alliteration right back to him if he was going to be snarky. She saw the corner of his mouth twitch at her fiery reply and it made a funny little place in her sing with joy.

Down, Rose. You don't even know this man, she thought to herself, furiously. And she also patted herself on the back for coming up with that clever wordplay despite her delicate situation.

"No, I decided I should talk to you to find out who the hell you were or, at the very least, what the hell you thought you were doing. But you had other plans."

"Like what?" Rose asked, wrinkling her nose and feeling her blush begin to creep back up. Maybe she'd made a move on him after all. If past instances were to be believed, Drunk Rose was capable of a good many things. Honestly, it was incredible she'd never had a one night stand before this.

"Well, first off, you babbled at me about everything under the sun, nonstop, for about twenty minutes, and the whole time you absolutely refused to either let go of Jack or to move off the sidewalk," he began, raising an eyebrow at her and clearly enjoying having this information over her.

"And then?"

"And then I tried to help you up off the ground - which you did not make easy, mind," he continued, crossing his arms over his chest, that little grin of his tugging at the corners of his mouth once more.

"And then?" Rose prompted at his next silence. The smile twitched again.

"And then you threw up on my boots and passed out stone cold," he said, dryly. "Your mobile was dead and I didn't want to leave you out on the sidewalk, so I brought you in here and figured I'd just let you sleep it off."

Rose stared at him, processing his story and trying to find an appropriate response. Unable to come up with much of anything, really, she decided to go with 'mortified apology'. "I am so, so sorry! I never do this, honest. I just got back from a year of backpacking and some of my old mates wanted to go out to celebrate. Must not be able to hold my liquor anymore." She vaguely remembered Shireen and Keshia each heading out with a bloke of their own last night, saying she would get home just fine once she'd finished her last drink.

Except she'd just moved into her new flat a few days ago and even sober she had trouble remembering her new address. Three sheets to the wind, she never would have stood a chance at remembering where to go. Her flat was in Bayswater, just over near Queensway, actually. She wondered how close she'd managed to get before getting distracted by the gorgeous dog.

And the gorgeous man. But that was neither here nor there and, apparently, she'd thrown up on his shoes. Which was probably not very promising for any future interactions with said gorgeous man. Jack put his head in her lap once more and she absently petted him as she fought her embarrassment in front of his smirking owner.

Still, best make sure she understood last night accurately. He seemed like a good man, an honest man. In fact, he held himself proudly and a bit stiffly, like a military man who didn't quite know how to react to denims and stocking-ed feet. But still...

"So, we didn't, ah," Rose trailed off and lifted her eyebrows at him meaningfully.

He, once again, snorted with no small amount of derision. "No, not at all."

"Well, you don't have to be quite so mean about it," she answered, indignant despite herself. He didn't have to sound quite so repulsed.

"Forgive me, but I prefer my women conscious. And not drunk off their arses." Rose tried to find a valid argument to that, but, of course, couldn't. "Anyway, Jack had appointed himself your protector, anyway. Soon as I got you into the door and onto the couch, he planted himself next to you and wouldn't move. I don't even let him up on the furniture, but he wouldn't budge, so I just put a blanket over the two of you and left you to it."'

After a long awkward pause, Rose finally said, "Right. Well, then, if you'll just point me toward my shoes, I'll be on my way, trying not to die of embarrassment."

"So you remember where you live now?" he asked, his tone almost entirely one of sincere concern and curiosity.

"Yes. I just moved in a few days ago which is why I couldn't remember last night," Rose replied, tersely, missing his look of surprise at that snippet of information and moving toward what she assumed was the door out of the flat . She could see her precarious heels neatly placed beside an enormous pair of battered, yet suspiciously clean combat boots. "Sorry 'bout your shoes."

She saw him shrug out of the corner of her eye. "S'all right. They've seen worse."

She slipped on her heels, wobbling a bit. "Purse?" she asked.

He stood up and, oh he was tall, too, and limped over to the bar that separated the small kitchen from the living area. She could tell he was favouring his right leg heavily and she tried not to stare as he moved past her, plucking her shiny black clutch from the surface. He held the small object out to her, his blue eyes almost daring her to make a comment about his gait. She did no such thing.

"Let me get your mobile for you," he said, gruffly, turning away from her to move into the kitchen where she could see her device plugged into a wall socket. "Thought maybe you'd have a boyfriend to phone to come pick you up this morning or something."

Rose smiled at both the thoughtful gesture and at his not-so-subtle questioning. Maybe she wasn't the only one who met a gorgeous stranger last night. She was a bit of an all right in this short, spangly dress, if she did say so herself. "No boyfriend," she replied, easily, plucking the phone from his fingers and barely containing her smile of triumph when his eyes lit up a bit more with that information. "I'm Rose, by the way."

"John," he answered, holding out a large, calloused hand. There was a long, charged moment between them as they hung on just a bit too long, before Jack came barging in, knocking into Rose's legs and sending her falling toward John. They both laughed as he caught her easily and helped her straighten up. "D'you need me to call you a cab or give you directions?" he asked, moving toward the door with her, his hand lingering just behind her back.

"Yeah, actually," Rose answered, blinking in the bright sunlight as John pulled the door open for her and the two of them walked out on to the steps of his duplex. "I'm looking for 111 Gallifrey Str - oh." Rose trailed off, catching sight of the street sign just ahead and then spinning on her heel to look back at the number on his door, which read '109'.

"So much for not ever running into you at Tesco," she laughed, pointing at the other half of the duplex. She gave him a playful, tongue-touched smile. "Guess I remembered my address after all. Hullo, neighbor."

John blinked at her and then his smile widened once more. "Hullo, neighbor. Come to borrow a cup of sugar?"

"No, but I'd love breakfast and a cuppa. After a shower, of course. But I've heard there's a lovely little diner around the corner...d'you, um, d'you want to join me?"

He hesitated a moment, his face a mask of indecision, and so Rose added, "They've got tables outside, too, so Jack could come. S'the least I could do after last night."

Behind his knees Jack barked once, sharp and loud, and John's tense expression melted away. "Love to," he answered. "10:00?"

"Are you going to pick me up or shall I meet you at your place?" Rose joked, smiling at him again.

"Oh, I think we can play it by ear," he responded, watching her move down his half of the steps and up hers on the other side of the small barrier.

"10:00," Rose said, pulling open her door and looking back over at him once more.

"I'll be here," he said, softly.