Four times the Doctor and Rose tried to find a new companion; and one time they succeeded
Title: Four times the Doctor and Rose tried to find a new companion; and one time they succeeded
Rating: All Ages
Characters/Pairings: Ten II/Rose
Word Count: 1497
A/N: What it says on the tin. Written for Round 2.05 of writerinatardis . The prompt was: "This list of things must appear in some capacity: A snatch of song lyrics, an unusual color, the name of a band, a Shakespearean character, an item usually found in a child's room, and a quote from page 57 of the book closest to the author at the time of writing."
I.
The Doctor traced little arabesques in the dirt with the toe of his trainer, suddenly feeling quite silly. The new TARDIS hummed in the background, while Rose furrowed her brow, confirming the Doctor's misgivings.
"But I thought it would be... you know, just us." She sounded genuinely confused and disappointed, and the Doctor regretted his suggestion that they ask someone else to join them on their first proper trip.
"Of course it can be," he said soothingly, moving towards her. "I'm sorry for asking."
"No," Rose said, looking up with big, full eyes. "No, it's something you wanted-"
"It's just that you've already seen so much up there, and so have I. It's more fun if there's someone around who it's all new to."
Rose's face fell into a resigned expression, and she bit a nail in thought. "What about..."
"If you're about to say your mum, I'm going to suggest that you stop there."
She laughed, breaking the tension. "No, I was thinking of people from work. At least with them you know they won't have a coronary the first time they see an alien. Besides, if Mum came, she'd have to bring Tony and then there'd be nappies, and I'm not sure how the TARDIS would feel about cleaning those."
He wrinkled his nose and smiled warmly at her. "I was thinking... what about Pauline, from the lab?"
Rose's mouth scrunched into a just-ate-a-lemon pucker.
"What?" the Doctor asked. Rose had always like Pauline. They'd even gone out together for drinks a few times. "What's wrong with Pauline? She's very good at what she does."
"Everything's so... easy for Pauline. And I mean everything. It's infuriating."
Now the Doctor really was confused. "But isn't that a good thing? When we're facing down the U'jazzg and their advanced foam weaponry, don't we want someone around who's as brilliant as we are?"
Rose's answer was merely the arch of an eyebrow and a lowered gaze that said all the Doctor needed to know.
"Right, then. No Pauline. What about Margaret?" he asked hopefully.
"Margaret? But she's so stupid!"
II.
The Doctor's hand shot out from under a pile of wires and discarded wall panels. "Ted, I need you to hand me the spanner with the chartreuse band about the middle."
This really took every cake on that entire planet full of cakes that he'd been allowed to see for, oh, about ten seconds before this rubbish spaceship had started to make wheezy sounds and they'd all had to rush back inside before it took off without them.
"Right, spanner, chartreuse, got it," he said with forced cheer. Never in his life had he met two people more consistently and irritatingly happy. He wouldn't have come with them had he known that their mood when they'd met first was their baseline state of being. He'd rather thought it was brought about by them having just saved his planet from demolition by some very misguided performance artists.
He placed the spanner with the green band in the Doctor's outstretched hand, which disappeared again into the mess of wires and tubes spilling out of the wall. He was about to sit down against a nearby bit of coral when a shower of sparks came shooting from the aperture, followed closely by cursing so creative he felt like he should be taking notes.
"Mother of a blighted yak being ridden by a pus-covered U'jazzg!" The Doctor emerged again from the wall, his hair even more standing on end than normal, with artistic wisps of smoke coming off of his head. "I said the chartreuse spanner! This is celadon! Don't you know anything, boy?"
III.
"He's never succeeded in actually taking me to see a show, you know," Rose said conspiratorially, nudging Anna in the arm.
The Doctor immediately cut her off, waving his arms in protest. "Oi, we met Queen Victoria! I don't see why you're complaining."
"Queen Victoria and werewolves! So go on then, let's go to a show, if you're so capable of it." Rose giggled and turned back to the young girl. "What do you fancy, Anna? First trip, anywhere you want to go, any band you want to see, past or present."
Anna bit her lip and looked towards the domed ceiling of the console room, thinking. "How about... the Spice Girls? I was so upset when they broke up."
The Doctor looked at Rose. Rose looked at the Doctor. They both turned to look at Anna, and the Doctor pointed towards the doors.
"Out."
IV.
Colin put his fork down with a clatter and took a long sip of wine, never taking his eyes from the Doctor. Rose looked back and forth between them, nibbling on a carrot and trying to decide if the glances being exchanged were troubling or hot. Perhaps both.
"I'm sorry, I can't go another minute without getting this off my chest," Colin said solemnly.
Rose kept silent, the edges of her mouth curling up just a little bit. She had no idea what their new companion was on about, but she had a feeling that whatever it was, it was going to be good.
"I feel it's incumbent on me to inform you... the blue is not working."
Rose burst out with an ill-timed Ha!, before going back to her salad.
"I like the blue! Why does everyone slag off the blue?" the Doctor shot back, deep furrows forming in his brow.
"He's convinced the blue is good," Rose said. "Got seven of those suits, him. Had them made special."
The look of abject horror on Colin's face was completely priceless and she reached out and took his hand in sympathy. "I know," she said. "But you try talking some sense into him."
"Oi, I am right here!" the Doctor protested, cutting into his baked potato with such force that it nearly shot off his plate.
Colin sighed the sigh of the long-suffering. "You want earth tones, or pastels with your complexion. And the t-shirt under a suit jacket... it's a bit Miami Vice, isn’t it." He shuddered. "It's going to have to be natural fibres for you, they'll hang better off your frame. Your broad shoulders with a nice linen blend would be perfect. Have you thought about waistcoats?"
"What is this, Queer Eye for the Time Lord?" the Doctor said prissily.
"You should listen to him," Rose said, waving her fork at his current ensemble. "It's not many men can pull off a waistcoat. You should take advantage."
"Oh, you too, Brutus?" The Doctor buried his head in his hands and scratched at his scalp as if to scrub the entire conversation from his brain.
Colin cleared his throat and narrowed his eyes towards the Doctor. "And let's talk about the haircut while we're at it. You look like a hedgehog."
V.
Rose and the Doctor walked hand-in-hand through damp London streets. The lights from zeppelins overhead occasionally attempted to cut through the fog and drizzle, but never quite made it to the pavement.
"You were right," the Doctor said, his voice falling flat in the dense air.
"I know," Rose answered. "What was I right about this time?"
"Travelling companions. It should be just me and you."
"Oh, I dunno," Rose mused. "Just because we haven't found the right one yet doesn't mean we won't."
The Doctor sighed and kicked a paper cup out of his way.
"It's just we've been sort of forcing it, you know?" Rose continued. "If we stop looking, that's when we'll find the right person. We'll just wake up one morning and there they'll be. Waiting for us."
They rounded a corner and fell silent again. Rose took the Doctor's hand and squeezed it, composing a little speech in her head about how they'd met, when her train of thought was broken by the sound of a woman giving some poor sod an extreme tongue-lashing. The Doctor's posture stiffened and he looked around.
"Always ready to save a damsel in distress," Rose teased as he craned his neck, looking for the source.
"No, it's not that. But yes, I am."
The woman started up again, unseen but likely in an alleyway up ahead: "What's it that the Americans say? Give me liberty or give me death? How about this one, sunshine: Give me liberty or I'll give you death! Get your bleeding hands off me!"
The Doctor took off at a run, dragging Rose behind him, and rounded the alley breathlessly to see an angry ginger-headed woman wrenching her arm from the grasp of two yobbish youths in shell suits. All parties stared at one another before the would-be muggers ran off, climbing over a fence at the far end of the alley.
"And who the hell are you?" the woman demanded, recovering her handbag from the top of a nearby skip.
"Fantastic!" the Doctor beamed, and he kissed Rose on the forehead before striding towards the woman, hand outstretched in greeting.
Rating: All Ages
Characters/Pairings: Ten II/Rose
Word Count: 1497
A/N: What it says on the tin. Written for Round 2.05 of writerinatardis . The prompt was: "This list of things must appear in some capacity: A snatch of song lyrics, an unusual color, the name of a band, a Shakespearean character, an item usually found in a child's room, and a quote from page 57 of the book closest to the author at the time of writing."
I.
The Doctor traced little arabesques in the dirt with the toe of his trainer, suddenly feeling quite silly. The new TARDIS hummed in the background, while Rose furrowed her brow, confirming the Doctor's misgivings.
"But I thought it would be... you know, just us." She sounded genuinely confused and disappointed, and the Doctor regretted his suggestion that they ask someone else to join them on their first proper trip.
"Of course it can be," he said soothingly, moving towards her. "I'm sorry for asking."
"No," Rose said, looking up with big, full eyes. "No, it's something you wanted-"
"It's just that you've already seen so much up there, and so have I. It's more fun if there's someone around who it's all new to."
Rose's face fell into a resigned expression, and she bit a nail in thought. "What about..."
"If you're about to say your mum, I'm going to suggest that you stop there."
She laughed, breaking the tension. "No, I was thinking of people from work. At least with them you know they won't have a coronary the first time they see an alien. Besides, if Mum came, she'd have to bring Tony and then there'd be nappies, and I'm not sure how the TARDIS would feel about cleaning those."
He wrinkled his nose and smiled warmly at her. "I was thinking... what about Pauline, from the lab?"
Rose's mouth scrunched into a just-ate-a-lemon pucker.
"What?" the Doctor asked. Rose had always like Pauline. They'd even gone out together for drinks a few times. "What's wrong with Pauline? She's very good at what she does."
"Everything's so... easy for Pauline. And I mean everything. It's infuriating."
Now the Doctor really was confused. "But isn't that a good thing? When we're facing down the U'jazzg and their advanced foam weaponry, don't we want someone around who's as brilliant as we are?"
Rose's answer was merely the arch of an eyebrow and a lowered gaze that said all the Doctor needed to know.
"Right, then. No Pauline. What about Margaret?" he asked hopefully.
"Margaret? But she's so stupid!"
II.
The Doctor's hand shot out from under a pile of wires and discarded wall panels. "Ted, I need you to hand me the spanner with the chartreuse band about the middle."
This really took every cake on that entire planet full of cakes that he'd been allowed to see for, oh, about ten seconds before this rubbish spaceship had started to make wheezy sounds and they'd all had to rush back inside before it took off without them.
"Right, spanner, chartreuse, got it," he said with forced cheer. Never in his life had he met two people more consistently and irritatingly happy. He wouldn't have come with them had he known that their mood when they'd met first was their baseline state of being. He'd rather thought it was brought about by them having just saved his planet from demolition by some very misguided performance artists.
He placed the spanner with the green band in the Doctor's outstretched hand, which disappeared again into the mess of wires and tubes spilling out of the wall. He was about to sit down against a nearby bit of coral when a shower of sparks came shooting from the aperture, followed closely by cursing so creative he felt like he should be taking notes.
"Mother of a blighted yak being ridden by a pus-covered U'jazzg!" The Doctor emerged again from the wall, his hair even more standing on end than normal, with artistic wisps of smoke coming off of his head. "I said the chartreuse spanner! This is celadon! Don't you know anything, boy?"
III.
"He's never succeeded in actually taking me to see a show, you know," Rose said conspiratorially, nudging Anna in the arm.
The Doctor immediately cut her off, waving his arms in protest. "Oi, we met Queen Victoria! I don't see why you're complaining."
"Queen Victoria and werewolves! So go on then, let's go to a show, if you're so capable of it." Rose giggled and turned back to the young girl. "What do you fancy, Anna? First trip, anywhere you want to go, any band you want to see, past or present."
Anna bit her lip and looked towards the domed ceiling of the console room, thinking. "How about... the Spice Girls? I was so upset when they broke up."
The Doctor looked at Rose. Rose looked at the Doctor. They both turned to look at Anna, and the Doctor pointed towards the doors.
"Out."
IV.
Colin put his fork down with a clatter and took a long sip of wine, never taking his eyes from the Doctor. Rose looked back and forth between them, nibbling on a carrot and trying to decide if the glances being exchanged were troubling or hot. Perhaps both.
"I'm sorry, I can't go another minute without getting this off my chest," Colin said solemnly.
Rose kept silent, the edges of her mouth curling up just a little bit. She had no idea what their new companion was on about, but she had a feeling that whatever it was, it was going to be good.
"I feel it's incumbent on me to inform you... the blue is not working."
Rose burst out with an ill-timed Ha!, before going back to her salad.
"I like the blue! Why does everyone slag off the blue?" the Doctor shot back, deep furrows forming in his brow.
"He's convinced the blue is good," Rose said. "Got seven of those suits, him. Had them made special."
The look of abject horror on Colin's face was completely priceless and she reached out and took his hand in sympathy. "I know," she said. "But you try talking some sense into him."
"Oi, I am right here!" the Doctor protested, cutting into his baked potato with such force that it nearly shot off his plate.
Colin sighed the sigh of the long-suffering. "You want earth tones, or pastels with your complexion. And the t-shirt under a suit jacket... it's a bit Miami Vice, isn’t it." He shuddered. "It's going to have to be natural fibres for you, they'll hang better off your frame. Your broad shoulders with a nice linen blend would be perfect. Have you thought about waistcoats?"
"What is this, Queer Eye for the Time Lord?" the Doctor said prissily.
"You should listen to him," Rose said, waving her fork at his current ensemble. "It's not many men can pull off a waistcoat. You should take advantage."
"Oh, you too, Brutus?" The Doctor buried his head in his hands and scratched at his scalp as if to scrub the entire conversation from his brain.
Colin cleared his throat and narrowed his eyes towards the Doctor. "And let's talk about the haircut while we're at it. You look like a hedgehog."
V.
Rose and the Doctor walked hand-in-hand through damp London streets. The lights from zeppelins overhead occasionally attempted to cut through the fog and drizzle, but never quite made it to the pavement.
"You were right," the Doctor said, his voice falling flat in the dense air.
"I know," Rose answered. "What was I right about this time?"
"Travelling companions. It should be just me and you."
"Oh, I dunno," Rose mused. "Just because we haven't found the right one yet doesn't mean we won't."
The Doctor sighed and kicked a paper cup out of his way.
"It's just we've been sort of forcing it, you know?" Rose continued. "If we stop looking, that's when we'll find the right person. We'll just wake up one morning and there they'll be. Waiting for us."
They rounded a corner and fell silent again. Rose took the Doctor's hand and squeezed it, composing a little speech in her head about how they'd met, when her train of thought was broken by the sound of a woman giving some poor sod an extreme tongue-lashing. The Doctor's posture stiffened and he looked around.
"Always ready to save a damsel in distress," Rose teased as he craned his neck, looking for the source.
"No, it's not that. But yes, I am."
The woman started up again, unseen but likely in an alleyway up ahead: "What's it that the Americans say? Give me liberty or give me death? How about this one, sunshine: Give me liberty or I'll give you death! Get your bleeding hands off me!"
The Doctor took off at a run, dragging Rose behind him, and rounded the alley breathlessly to see an angry ginger-headed woman wrenching her arm from the grasp of two yobbish youths in shell suits. All parties stared at one another before the would-be muggers ran off, climbing over a fence at the far end of the alley.
"And who the hell are you?" the woman demanded, recovering her handbag from the top of a nearby skip.
"Fantastic!" the Doctor beamed, and he kissed Rose on the forehead before striding towards the woman, hand outstretched in greeting.