The Dog And Pony Show (Mickey/Jenny, 1000 words, 12+)
Post Journey's End
Jenny grins, and they run, which is pretty much par for the course, really, and Mickey thinks he has never been this fit, not when he was at school with twice weekly games sessions (and shower fodder for later furtive, half-shamed wank sessions), not when he was going up against Cybermen (and down on team-mates), not even after Rose came back and there they were, together again, defending the Earth (and together sometimes in that way, the comfort of an old familiar shag, even if it's up against the ramscoop of a Trilorian Dogbird Interceptor). He's lugging forty pounds of the sweetest multi-action phased-plasma cannon you can lay your hands on, sweating and panting but working it, two steps behind her the whole half-mile.
She's breathing easy, casual grace, perfect tempo, cool maestro gymnast grooving to the slow counter-beats of twin drumming hearts. Step, step, up, onto the railing and she's gone, out into space, half-pike double twist and pistols, somehow, in Jenny's hands, firing, and Mickey, riding the banister down side-saddle, swings his cannon around to ignite the fuel tanks she's just effortlessly cut down. He slips off the stairs, stumbles a little on the catwalk. She lands lightly beside him, perfect dismount, As the tanks drop past, all groaning metal, bright blue-white light, massive radiant heat, Jenny grabs his sweaty hand with her dry, cool own, grinning equally bright, and Mickey grins back - who wouldn't? - and they're off again, gone, gone, gone before the tanks can hit, can set off the last bay of fighters.
Maybe this is why he's here, these moments, the explosions, the running, the other explosions, double-handedly taking down an entire invasion fleet from inside the main carrier, saving the -- saving whatever planet it is they're saving. This is how it began, of course, except sometimes he thinks it didn't, that he just blundered into the middle of someone else's story again and got swept along for the ride. On Earth for three days, just long enough to work out being legally dead crimps potential big-time, and suddenly it's all duplicates this and Zygons that and some toothsome blonde with her own spaceship saying, "Nice to meet you, Mickey; run for your life."
They did, they do, they are, manic bouncing balls of interstellar justice, ricocheting from crisis to climax and back again in a retrofitted time-hopping red-painted chop-shopped shuttle. They're wanted in five systems and heroes in seven, so Mickey counts that as a win, especially because two of those systems want them for parking violations, which just goes to show that some things never change. Things like the running and the monsters and the explosions - love the explosions - and how, with their launch bays all merrily burning, the entire crew of slavering psychotic carnivores are now scouring the decks looking for payback. And he's a little worried that these are the moments he's here for, too, but it's easy not to think when moving is the only thing keeping you alive.
It's easy not to think in the aftermath, either, when you're done and dusty and, on a good day, no one's died, easy now, and easy then, that first time, after the Skarasen had been released and Jenny had turned to him, bright as ever, and perkily informed him that she'd been watching their cultural instruction vids, picking up stray digital broadcasts like an intergalactic netflix queue, and it would be appropriate for them to have sex now; easy enough to just nod and say, yeah, sure, I can do that.
Heavy weapons fire cuts them off from the core, which is a problem because their ship is clamped to the hull right on the central venting hatch, and Mickey's otherwise sweet cannon has a four-second refresh-cycle, which is a problem because the slavering psychotic carnivores have instantaneous automatics, and Jenny smells amazing, which is a problem because he's supposed to be thinking up escape plans but his brain keeps getting stuck on how her legs feel wrapped around his waist, how her teeth feel against his neck, the sound of her hearts in his ears and those little, breathy, whimpering sounds she makes when he moves inside her just so.
They're so far from Earth right now that distance has become meaningless. Time too, but what did Mickey expect? She's a jenny, a female of the species, something new but mostly old, mostly Time Lord, with all that comes with that. At least she's not taken to calling herself the Nurse, Mickey thinks, except then he's thinking of her in a naughty nurse outfit and so not helping. Maybe that's a Time Lord thing too. It took Rose the same way. Except he's definitely not thinking about that, either, so he looks around, and, whee, maintenance shaft! Fun times!
Jenny doesn't mind the dark or being enclosed and Mickey assumes this is more soldier-download stuff, how to survive in foxholes, assumes because he doesn't want to ask. How much of memory is instinctual, not written on neurons but ingrained in the very cells, in the DNA? Which parts of her reactions are considered, which parts simply reacting? Which parts of him are the same? A thing for blond(e)s with bright smiles, that's Mickey, a bumbling Bond, another loyal shooty dog thing - except she never calls him Ricky, so there's that, and she actually listens, though she questions too, indefatigably and annoyingly incisive on occasion and always, always involved.
They reach the bottom of the shaft and it's clear to the ship, save for those aliens, and he catches her off the last rung and pulls her close for the kiss she grins into. So maybe this, this is really why he's here, and if, sometimes, Mickey starts to think "suppose Rose and the Doctor had", he never lets himself finish. There's nothing good down that road and, besides, despite the old saying, he reckons there's virtue all the same to the unexamined life.
Jenny grins. And they run.
Jenny grins, and they run, which is pretty much par for the course, really, and Mickey thinks he has never been this fit, not when he was at school with twice weekly games sessions (and shower fodder for later furtive, half-shamed wank sessions), not when he was going up against Cybermen (and down on team-mates), not even after Rose came back and there they were, together again, defending the Earth (and together sometimes in that way, the comfort of an old familiar shag, even if it's up against the ramscoop of a Trilorian Dogbird Interceptor). He's lugging forty pounds of the sweetest multi-action phased-plasma cannon you can lay your hands on, sweating and panting but working it, two steps behind her the whole half-mile.
She's breathing easy, casual grace, perfect tempo, cool maestro gymnast grooving to the slow counter-beats of twin drumming hearts. Step, step, up, onto the railing and she's gone, out into space, half-pike double twist and pistols, somehow, in Jenny's hands, firing, and Mickey, riding the banister down side-saddle, swings his cannon around to ignite the fuel tanks she's just effortlessly cut down. He slips off the stairs, stumbles a little on the catwalk. She lands lightly beside him, perfect dismount, As the tanks drop past, all groaning metal, bright blue-white light, massive radiant heat, Jenny grabs his sweaty hand with her dry, cool own, grinning equally bright, and Mickey grins back - who wouldn't? - and they're off again, gone, gone, gone before the tanks can hit, can set off the last bay of fighters.
Maybe this is why he's here, these moments, the explosions, the running, the other explosions, double-handedly taking down an entire invasion fleet from inside the main carrier, saving the -- saving whatever planet it is they're saving. This is how it began, of course, except sometimes he thinks it didn't, that he just blundered into the middle of someone else's story again and got swept along for the ride. On Earth for three days, just long enough to work out being legally dead crimps potential big-time, and suddenly it's all duplicates this and Zygons that and some toothsome blonde with her own spaceship saying, "Nice to meet you, Mickey; run for your life."
They did, they do, they are, manic bouncing balls of interstellar justice, ricocheting from crisis to climax and back again in a retrofitted time-hopping red-painted chop-shopped shuttle. They're wanted in five systems and heroes in seven, so Mickey counts that as a win, especially because two of those systems want them for parking violations, which just goes to show that some things never change. Things like the running and the monsters and the explosions - love the explosions - and how, with their launch bays all merrily burning, the entire crew of slavering psychotic carnivores are now scouring the decks looking for payback. And he's a little worried that these are the moments he's here for, too, but it's easy not to think when moving is the only thing keeping you alive.
It's easy not to think in the aftermath, either, when you're done and dusty and, on a good day, no one's died, easy now, and easy then, that first time, after the Skarasen had been released and Jenny had turned to him, bright as ever, and perkily informed him that she'd been watching their cultural instruction vids, picking up stray digital broadcasts like an intergalactic netflix queue, and it would be appropriate for them to have sex now; easy enough to just nod and say, yeah, sure, I can do that.
Heavy weapons fire cuts them off from the core, which is a problem because their ship is clamped to the hull right on the central venting hatch, and Mickey's otherwise sweet cannon has a four-second refresh-cycle, which is a problem because the slavering psychotic carnivores have instantaneous automatics, and Jenny smells amazing, which is a problem because he's supposed to be thinking up escape plans but his brain keeps getting stuck on how her legs feel wrapped around his waist, how her teeth feel against his neck, the sound of her hearts in his ears and those little, breathy, whimpering sounds she makes when he moves inside her just so.
They're so far from Earth right now that distance has become meaningless. Time too, but what did Mickey expect? She's a jenny, a female of the species, something new but mostly old, mostly Time Lord, with all that comes with that. At least she's not taken to calling herself the Nurse, Mickey thinks, except then he's thinking of her in a naughty nurse outfit and so not helping. Maybe that's a Time Lord thing too. It took Rose the same way. Except he's definitely not thinking about that, either, so he looks around, and, whee, maintenance shaft! Fun times!
Jenny doesn't mind the dark or being enclosed and Mickey assumes this is more soldier-download stuff, how to survive in foxholes, assumes because he doesn't want to ask. How much of memory is instinctual, not written on neurons but ingrained in the very cells, in the DNA? Which parts of her reactions are considered, which parts simply reacting? Which parts of him are the same? A thing for blond(e)s with bright smiles, that's Mickey, a bumbling Bond, another loyal shooty dog thing - except she never calls him Ricky, so there's that, and she actually listens, though she questions too, indefatigably and annoyingly incisive on occasion and always, always involved.
They reach the bottom of the shaft and it's clear to the ship, save for those aliens, and he catches her off the last rung and pulls her close for the kiss she grins into. So maybe this, this is really why he's here, and if, sometimes, Mickey starts to think "suppose Rose and the Doctor had", he never lets himself finish. There's nothing good down that road and, besides, despite the old saying, he reckons there's virtue all the same to the unexamined life.
Jenny grins. And they run.