"Hello sweetheart," he tells me kindly, as he sits down next to me and gives me the cup of tea he just spent several minutes making in the kitchen. "Feeling any better at all?"

"Not really," I reply, knowing he was so good at working with other human beings (especially me) that he would know if I was lying or not. It was no use to hide anything from him; somehow, he would always know if I wasn't feeling so hot. But the thing was, I did feel hot… it's just that I didn't ever want him to know. He fact that he knew I was feeling hot, and… bothered… well, it bothered me, too. I was only just now calmed down enough from my embarrassment to look him fully in both eyes again. That alien doctor, the other alien doctor he had talked with… she had betrayed me. She had told him something about me at this moment, this horribly timed moment, that I would never have wanted him to know. It was literally just bad timing…

Being on that planet was horrible. We were taken captive, but only to be studied - the aliens had limited experience with humans, and somehow the female doctor on this planet who was charged with examining us was acquainted with the Doctor. He and I were separated and I was examined from head to toe, while they studied the physiology. I spent my time not so much worried about being naked, but about the fact that this physician had the ability to read my thoughts - and even connect them with biological states of my own body. I had wondered if the Doctor had been through a similar exam experience, but she left me to talk with him about my 'medical condition,' to 'warn and advise him.' You would think I was a rabid animal. Before I could stop her from telling him what she had told me, she left me alone in the exam room - and I was still strapped to my own exam table.

But now, here I was, with the time lord doctor who now knew my shame. And what was the Doctor doing about it now, 45 minutes later, after we were allowed to board the TARDIS and jettison ourselves back into deep space? Doing something surprisingly normal, actually - making me tea. And now sitting next to me, right next to me, more close than I figured he would have wanted to be, given what that horrible alien doctor had said about me. He hands me the tea, in my favorite red mug.

"So then," he said after a moment or two, breaking me gently out of my thoughts. "We're still going to be traveling together a lot, I hope, so I really do think we need to discuss what the other doctor said."

"You're quite right," I reply. "After all, I still want to travel with you." I was just saying this to fill in space; I knew he was just trying to be gentle, and I was going with it. However, he was soon ready to say the rest.

"I know that you're uncomfortable-"

"I am, I'm sorry."

"It's nothing to apologize about!" he exclaims, before becoming calm and soothing again. He reaches over for a moment to take my hand, before realizing I've got both of my own clinging around the mug. He withdraws, deciding to play with his own fingers instead, making a pyramid out of his fingers. "Listen, Rose. There is no reason to feel badly about what the other doctor said. She's known for exaggerating, for making things sound way worse or more extravagant than they actually are. Do you know what I mean? What she said…"

"Honestly, doctor," I butt in before getting too cowardly, "I could lie and go along with what you have heard about what the alien doctor is known for, but then I would be living more of a lie instead of simply dealing with the truth now." I take a deep breath. "As bad as she made things sound, for the most part, they are true."

He bites his lips for a moment, and I know that he is trying to figure out the proper words to say. Usually it isn't so hard for him, but this situation is unique. "Rose… I know." I look up to him, and he nods, giving me a special comforting look with those sweet brown eyes. "I know that it's almost all true; I just wanted to be sure you wanted to go that honest route. Now that I know you do, that makes me feel much better."

"I…" I try to talk about the topic again, but the words simply fail to come out of my mouth. "I… I seem to want…"

"You want to have my children, essentially," he throws out there. I withdraw from the conversation, sinking down lower into my seat, trying not to cry with embarrassment again. "You really, really have the urge to actually become pregnant. With my children! Mine!" He looks at me for a moment longer, before gently tucking a piece of hair behind my ear. "Just my own." I know he's still thinking, so I don't say a word; I try to remain quiet while he's thinking. But right now, instead of fighting to keep quiet, I have no trouble at all; I do not know what to tell him, so it is easy to be silent.

"Rose," he tells me a moment later, "I know how you must be feeling."

"Oh doctor, you can't possibly know," I reply. If he was trying to make me feel better by saying that, it really wasn't working out so well. How could he possibly know how I was feeling? He was the Doctor. An alien life form. How could he, of all people, know what I was feeling? Then again, he was hardly ever wrong.

"Naw, no, Rose," he says, trying to get me to direct my attention onto him once again. He was always patient with me, but seemed to be more so now. "Please don't make a big deal out of any of this, alright? It's not that big of a deal." He reaches over to take my hand, and gives it a squeeze as he smiles to me, those big chocolate-brown eyes focused only on me. He stroked the back of my hand with his thumb, little circles, soothing me and keeping me focused on him. "Please, sweetheart, there's no need to feel embarrassed, really!" But when he says that, new tears are stinging my eyes once again - and he knows I'm going to need more reassurance. "Really, sweetheart. What is it that's bothering you so much?"

"It only bothers me that you know." I wanted to just be honest with it, so that hopefully he would just leave it alone. But of course, that would just be too easy for him. "Why does it bother you?" he asks, innocently enough.

"It's just embarrassing."

"But that's the thing - why is it so embarrassing to you?" he asks. When he looks up at me with those innocent eyes again, I can't help but stutter in response, "Because, I... I... oh, Doctor." I hang my head, unable to get the words out. But he continues to wait, ever patiently now, truly wanting me to answer as candidly as possible. I finally look back up to him, whispering, "I never wanted you to know."

"Oh, Rose. My dear Rose." He squeezes my hand and scoots a little bit closer to me. "I know you're a more secretive person just by your natural personality, and it was definitely not right of the other doctor to say a word about that to me, you're right. But at the same time, you and I... we travel together. We're alone most of the time. We get cooped up together. And not to be mean or anything, my darling, and I mean this in the best way possible..." He looks me in the eyes. "You're human, and as a human you all express so many wonderful, vacillating, interesting emotions. Sometimes they seem to become absolutely overwhelming. I can relate to that, even. Not to mention human beings seem to be quite good at procreation, and have many emotions connected to that. I think this is just another one of them, Rose. We are going to learn private things about each other eventually, and I can only hope you trust me enough to let that happen."

"Nothing could be more personal," I state, feeling my anger toward that female doctor boiling up in me once again. "Anything else would have been better. Anything."

"Well, it's not as though you said something horrible about me," he smiles. I look up at him and he explains, getting a bit more serious again, "You see, Rose, it's not like you had much of anything bad to say about me, no! Quite the opposite. And if you're thinking in tems of purely sexual thought, that might be a different case. And while purely sexual thought may be all fine and good on its own, what the doctor told me was quite fascinating to me." When he said this, I realized I didn't know exactly what the doctor had told the Doctor about; only that he knew I wanted to have his babies. What else had that doctor said about me? "What did she say?" I ask, only hoping he would give me the answer. At this point, he scoots closer to me still. He looks up at me, the space between us close and intimate. He was establishing a comfortable and private space between us, even though we were alone in the middle of a galaxy in the TARDIS. Still, though, I appreciate his efforts, even though they were making me squirm a bit.

"That doctor told me that you were filled with more than just sexual desire," he said, "although she made sure to tell me that it was definitely present." I blushed anew, burning as though I was on fire. "However, she also said that the desires you were feeling were only your body's response to wanting to do something you find very important on a subconscious level - that is, wanting to bear children with my DNA, to keep my blood line going in whatever way you could. Because your body can feel my body, and you see my human body, and I feel nothing but fully human to you. And you are struggling subconsciously on so many levels to fight it, but she told me that you are actually physically prepared to fertilize your eggs with any contribution I can give them... in the name of keeping me alive and living on. For good." I keep my head down the entire time he says all of this, unable to look at him, because it was all so maddeningly true.

"That's not such a bad thing," he comforts me. "Really, it's not."

"Oh, come on! Imagine how it must feel to be me right now," I try to explain, trying to take the focus off of my burning face for a moment or two. "Imagine feeling that way about someone else, knowing that it is impossible and improbable to do. It just doesn't make any sense, but I can't seem to stop it. I would stop it if only I knew how!"

"I don't think you're supposed to stop basic biology," he says with a smile. "Now, why don't you get some work done? Get your mind off things. We can talk more about this later, but for now we really need to get that repair work. The TARDIS, she gets impatient." And with that, he was off - and I was still left with a million racing thoughts. Little did I know that this situation was far from being over.