BtVS/Doctor Who/Torchwood crossover fic
Yesterday, I was flailing around wondering where I'd mislaid my sense of fun. I found it while poking around my hard drive, in this fic that I started while on vacation and never finished. Someone else must have written this bunny up, but here's my take. Thanks to appomattoxco for the original bunny and xanphibian for acting as muse.
Title: Who's the Doctor?
Rating:PG
Summary: In an AU version of "As You Were," Riley returns and tells Buffy that Spike or someone calling himself "the Doctor" is collecting dangerous Suvolte eggs that the Initiative wants to keep safe and study.
Minor casting spoilers for the new DW, Season 3, Torchwood Season 2. No additional spoilers because I don't know any.
About 2,000 words
Buffy stormed into Spike's crypt, marched up to his TV, shut it off, and turned around to face the hapless vampire who had been slouched in his comfy chair. "Are you the Doctor?"
"Only if you want to play the patient."
"Spike, I'm serious. Riley said you're calling yourself the Doctor and selling dangerous Sodomite eggs to dangerous demons." She opened the fridge door, shut it, and peeked under the lid of a sarcophagus. Finding nothing, she dropped the lid with a crash that left a crack along its granite surface.
Spike hadn't moved. He was glowering at her. "So, G.I. Joe is back in town?"
"Yes, with his wife!"
"Ah now the foul temper makes more sense!" Spike shifted at last as she looked under his chair.
"Spike, you're the one who told me I wasn't over Riley because there was nothing to get over! I'm not upset about him. I'm upset because you said you wouldn't lie to me, and now Riley tells me you have."
"And because Mr. Pillar of Rectitude said it, it must be true?"
"Are you the Doctor?" Finding nothing more compromising upstairs than some porn movies on VHS and a half-empty bag of Doritos, Buffy jumped down to his bedroom.
He followed her, still protesting. "No, I'm not the Doctor. Yeah, I know who he is. No, he's not an evil demon. And, yeah, I've got the eggs. Never said I didn't, so I didn't lie. I'm holding them for him."
"Who? The Doctor? Why? And where are they?" Seeing nothing but the usual mess of skulls and harshly-used furniture, she strode across his bedroom, through what might be laughably called his bathroom, and to the passage he used to access the Sunnydale sewer system. Her way was blocked by something large, solid and blue, with a strange message on the front. "What the hell is this thing?" She walked around it.
"Balls! Couldn't they have showed up a half-hour ago?" Spike stood in front of the box, hands on hips, glaring at it.
"What is it?" Buffy repeated.
"It's a police box."
"Spike, that's the kind of information that's not. What's a police box?"
"They used to have them across the pond. People could use them to call for help when I -- if someone was chasing them, and bobbies could lock someone inside for a bit while waiting for backup."
Buffy blinked. "How did it get here?"
Before Spike could even try to answer, a door in the box opened and a dark-haired man poked his head out. "Ah, there you are!" he chortled happily. He caught sight of Buffy and waved. "Hullo, there!"
"Slayer, this is the Doctor. Doctor, this is the Slayer."
"What's a Slayer?" A pretty black girl with an English accent followed the Doctor out of the box.
"They kill vampires."
The Doctor spoke with the confidence of someone who knows just about everything. He was also very cute, but Buffy was having trouble getting past his outfit, which was a business suit, worn with a long coat and sneakers.
Yet another voice chimed in. "Doesn't that make you nervous, Spike?" This man was very handsome, with an American accent that sounded just a little bit wrong, and a smile that made Buffy smile back. There was something soldier-ish about him. He reminded her a little of Riley. That is, if Riley had been sexy and wild and funny and ….
Buffy forced her mind back to the issue at hand. Which wasn't even why those three had been in that little box, as intriguing a question as that was. Not that they don't look like they'd enjoy being in close quarters with each other. She asked in a no-nonsense tone, "Why do you need demon eggs?"
"Ah, here they are!" cried the Doctor. Instead of answering her, he crouched down next to a box a few feet down the passage and pulled a stick out of his pocket. The stick thing made a buzzing noise as he passed it over the contents of the box. The pretty girl knelt next to him and they started talking in big words.
The third visitor was still smiling at Buffy. "Hello, I'm Captain Jack Harkness." The way he said the words, they seemed to carry the additional meaning, "I think you and I should find the nearest hotel room and get naked as quickly as possible."
"Stop that!" called the Doctor over his shoulder.
Buffy crossed her arms and said in a louder tone, "What do you want with those eggs?"
Captain Jack was the only one to answer. "Well, see, if it should happen, sometime in what maybe we should just call 'the future', that the biological weapon the US government made got loose, and that there were a lot of people dying in excruciating pain, and that a doctor like Martha here figured out how to make an antidote out of the embryos, but by that time the Sulovites were extinct, so there were no more embryos, well, if all that happened, then it would be really convenient for us to have these. So we asked Spike to find some." He paused, and added lamely, "Just in case that other stuff should happen six years and a month or so from now."
Somehow, all of that managed to sound like the subtext was, "You'll really like seeing me naked."
"And I can see why you'd want to be prepared for that. Happens to me all the time." Her need for sarcasm satisfied, Buffy reran his words in her head and tried again to clear up a basic point of confusion. "Martha’s the doctor?"
The girl stood up. "I’m a doctor." She pointed at her companion. "He’s the Doctor. And these eggs will do."
"You know how it is," said the "Doctor," looking up. "After all, you're the Slayer." He was still grinning maniacally. Buffy was beginning to suspect that was his default expression.
Buffy gave up and went with it. "Sure. Whatever."
The Doctor finally stopped running his buzzing whatever-it-was and stood up.
Martha said, "We should get them inside the TARDIS right away. I can refrigerate them to make sure they don't hatch and we can start making the antidote as soon as we get to Torchwood."
"Just a moment!" Buffy stood between the blue box and Spike's odd visitors. "I am the Slayer, this is my town, and there will be no demon-egg trade here!"
"It's not a 'Just Say No' moment, Buffy," said Spike.
"How would you know? When have you ever said, 'No?'"
He rolled his eyes. "Can’t do anything right according to you, can I? This is a bloody good deed, Slayer, and I did it to impress you!"
"You asked for a thousand dollars!" objected the Doctor.
Spike shrugged. "Well, yeah, but that was to satisfy my principles. The ‘save the poor dying people’ part was for her."
The Doctor faced Buffy, serious at last. "I know what a Slayer is, and I'm sure you could stop us if you decide to, but I also think you know that we're not planning to harm anyone. Quite the opposite."
Buffy looked from Spike to the three strangers, meeting the eyes of each one in turn. Spike's were sulky, the Doctor's confident, and Martha's pleading. Jack winked at her. I have to decide. Do I trust a crazy vampire and three other even crazier people who apparently travel around in a box doing God knows what (although I can guess) or a man I dated for a year, who is such a Good Guy that even Spike calls him a Pillar of Rectaltube. She frowned. That last phrase didn't sound right, even in her head.
But then she thought back and remembered Riley saying, "It's vitally important we find the eggs whole so that we can study them. We already have some samples…"
Then she remembered Captain Jack saying, "The biological weapon the US government made got loose…"
Riley would not knowingly help the government make a horrible biological weapon. But the key word was "knowingly."
Buffy stepped away from the big box. "Okay," she said, hoping she was making the right decision.
It was hard to imagine the three people who managed to get the eggs inside the box as Evil Villains. They had Unlikely Heroes written all over them. It was even harder to imagine how they managed to squeeze themselves and the box of eggs inside, but somehow they did, one at a time.
"Thank you, and I look forward to meeting you again." The Doctor smiled warmly.
"Is that likely?" asked Spike.
"Oh, about a 100 percent probability, I'd say, based on my personal experience."
Martha was beaming. "You really have helped a lot of people today."
Captain Jack was the last to pass through the blue door. "Much appreciated. And if you're ever in Cardiff--" An arm reached out, pulled him all the way inside, and the door shut firmly.
"Better step back," said Spike.
"What does it do?" Buffy let him pull her towards his bedroom as the box made a strange, rhythmic noise and disappeared. "Okay, so that's what it does."
Spike was regarding her cautiously. She was regarding him with exasperation.
"Trying to impress me?"
"Yeah." He added slowly, "Mind, the way he asked, it felt impossible to refuse. It was as if I’d told him myself exactly what to say to make me go steal those eggs for him."
Buffy’s qualms returned. "And that doesn’t strike you as suspicious?"
Thus began an argument, which ended as most of their arguments did, with some very satisfying orgasms.
Buffy must have fallen asleep, because the next thing she knew she was waking up to the sound of boots tramping and soldiers yelling. She sat up in bed, saw who was standing at the bottom of the ladder that led to the main floor of the crypt, and snatched a sheet up over her naked torso. "Uh, hi, Riley."
Spike rolled over and gazed blearily at Riley. "Bugger. Another pogrom. Do me a favor and don't break my telly again. And hands off the porn."
Riley stood still as soldiers ran past him toward the sewer passages. Another was poking around among the skulls and the bottles in Spike's bar. At last he said, "I didn't expect this."
"Hey, I'm not the Spanish Inquisition!" protested Spike. When the others stared at him blankly, he muttered, "Bloody Philistines."
Buffy suddenly felt a surge of anger at her ex-boyfriend to go with the permanent undercurrent of annoyance she felt for her current one. "Maybe you never did really understand me, Riley." She yelled at the soldiers, "You won't find the eggs. They're not here!"
"We'll check for ourselves," said Riley grimly.
"Of course you will," agreed Spike.
"The Bio-weapons guys are going to be pissed if we come back empty-handed," one of the soldiers commented to Riley.
"Your weapons guys may just have to accept their eggs may have been omeletized," said Buffy, suddenly certain she had made the right choice.
"All the kings’ horses," agreed Spike.
Buffy pulled the sheet over her head and tried to pretend she wasn't there as the soldiers searched the crypt. Spike sat up in bed next to her, smoked a cigarette, and muttered curses. At last, only Riley was left, and Buffy peeked out from under the covers, sitting up to meet his glare.
"I know he had those eggs, Buffy." Riley gestured at Spike, who responded with an annoying little wave and a puff on his cigarette.
Buffy shrugged. "Well, maybe he also knows someone who could dematerialize them so you couldn't find them."
Riley shook his head, gave her an "I'm very disappointed in you," look, and left.
Buffy fell back on the pillows. "Well, all's well that ends, I suppose."
"It sodding well isn't!" growled Spike.
"What's wrong with you? They didn't smash your TV or take your porn. And I really don't think Riley's going to be visiting me ever again."
"No, but the bloody Doctor didn't pay me for the eggs!"
The End
Title: Who's the Doctor?
Rating:PG
Summary: In an AU version of "As You Were," Riley returns and tells Buffy that Spike or someone calling himself "the Doctor" is collecting dangerous Suvolte eggs that the Initiative wants to keep safe and study.
Minor casting spoilers for the new DW, Season 3, Torchwood Season 2. No additional spoilers because I don't know any.
About 2,000 words
Buffy stormed into Spike's crypt, marched up to his TV, shut it off, and turned around to face the hapless vampire who had been slouched in his comfy chair. "Are you the Doctor?"
"Only if you want to play the patient."
"Spike, I'm serious. Riley said you're calling yourself the Doctor and selling dangerous Sodomite eggs to dangerous demons." She opened the fridge door, shut it, and peeked under the lid of a sarcophagus. Finding nothing, she dropped the lid with a crash that left a crack along its granite surface.
Spike hadn't moved. He was glowering at her. "So, G.I. Joe is back in town?"
"Yes, with his wife!"
"Ah now the foul temper makes more sense!" Spike shifted at last as she looked under his chair.
"Spike, you're the one who told me I wasn't over Riley because there was nothing to get over! I'm not upset about him. I'm upset because you said you wouldn't lie to me, and now Riley tells me you have."
"And because Mr. Pillar of Rectitude said it, it must be true?"
"Are you the Doctor?" Finding nothing more compromising upstairs than some porn movies on VHS and a half-empty bag of Doritos, Buffy jumped down to his bedroom.
He followed her, still protesting. "No, I'm not the Doctor. Yeah, I know who he is. No, he's not an evil demon. And, yeah, I've got the eggs. Never said I didn't, so I didn't lie. I'm holding them for him."
"Who? The Doctor? Why? And where are they?" Seeing nothing but the usual mess of skulls and harshly-used furniture, she strode across his bedroom, through what might be laughably called his bathroom, and to the passage he used to access the Sunnydale sewer system. Her way was blocked by something large, solid and blue, with a strange message on the front. "What the hell is this thing?" She walked around it.
"Balls! Couldn't they have showed up a half-hour ago?" Spike stood in front of the box, hands on hips, glaring at it.
"What is it?" Buffy repeated.
"It's a police box."
"Spike, that's the kind of information that's not. What's a police box?"
"They used to have them across the pond. People could use them to call for help when I -- if someone was chasing them, and bobbies could lock someone inside for a bit while waiting for backup."
Buffy blinked. "How did it get here?"
Before Spike could even try to answer, a door in the box opened and a dark-haired man poked his head out. "Ah, there you are!" he chortled happily. He caught sight of Buffy and waved. "Hullo, there!"
"Slayer, this is the Doctor. Doctor, this is the Slayer."
"What's a Slayer?" A pretty black girl with an English accent followed the Doctor out of the box.
"They kill vampires."
The Doctor spoke with the confidence of someone who knows just about everything. He was also very cute, but Buffy was having trouble getting past his outfit, which was a business suit, worn with a long coat and sneakers.
Yet another voice chimed in. "Doesn't that make you nervous, Spike?" This man was very handsome, with an American accent that sounded just a little bit wrong, and a smile that made Buffy smile back. There was something soldier-ish about him. He reminded her a little of Riley. That is, if Riley had been sexy and wild and funny and ….
Buffy forced her mind back to the issue at hand. Which wasn't even why those three had been in that little box, as intriguing a question as that was. Not that they don't look like they'd enjoy being in close quarters with each other. She asked in a no-nonsense tone, "Why do you need demon eggs?"
"Ah, here they are!" cried the Doctor. Instead of answering her, he crouched down next to a box a few feet down the passage and pulled a stick out of his pocket. The stick thing made a buzzing noise as he passed it over the contents of the box. The pretty girl knelt next to him and they started talking in big words.
The third visitor was still smiling at Buffy. "Hello, I'm Captain Jack Harkness." The way he said the words, they seemed to carry the additional meaning, "I think you and I should find the nearest hotel room and get naked as quickly as possible."
"Stop that!" called the Doctor over his shoulder.
Buffy crossed her arms and said in a louder tone, "What do you want with those eggs?"
Captain Jack was the only one to answer. "Well, see, if it should happen, sometime in what maybe we should just call 'the future', that the biological weapon the US government made got loose, and that there were a lot of people dying in excruciating pain, and that a doctor like Martha here figured out how to make an antidote out of the embryos, but by that time the Sulovites were extinct, so there were no more embryos, well, if all that happened, then it would be really convenient for us to have these. So we asked Spike to find some." He paused, and added lamely, "Just in case that other stuff should happen six years and a month or so from now."
Somehow, all of that managed to sound like the subtext was, "You'll really like seeing me naked."
"And I can see why you'd want to be prepared for that. Happens to me all the time." Her need for sarcasm satisfied, Buffy reran his words in her head and tried again to clear up a basic point of confusion. "Martha’s the doctor?"
The girl stood up. "I’m a doctor." She pointed at her companion. "He’s the Doctor. And these eggs will do."
"You know how it is," said the "Doctor," looking up. "After all, you're the Slayer." He was still grinning maniacally. Buffy was beginning to suspect that was his default expression.
Buffy gave up and went with it. "Sure. Whatever."
The Doctor finally stopped running his buzzing whatever-it-was and stood up.
Martha said, "We should get them inside the TARDIS right away. I can refrigerate them to make sure they don't hatch and we can start making the antidote as soon as we get to Torchwood."
"Just a moment!" Buffy stood between the blue box and Spike's odd visitors. "I am the Slayer, this is my town, and there will be no demon-egg trade here!"
"It's not a 'Just Say No' moment, Buffy," said Spike.
"How would you know? When have you ever said, 'No?'"
He rolled his eyes. "Can’t do anything right according to you, can I? This is a bloody good deed, Slayer, and I did it to impress you!"
"You asked for a thousand dollars!" objected the Doctor.
Spike shrugged. "Well, yeah, but that was to satisfy my principles. The ‘save the poor dying people’ part was for her."
The Doctor faced Buffy, serious at last. "I know what a Slayer is, and I'm sure you could stop us if you decide to, but I also think you know that we're not planning to harm anyone. Quite the opposite."
Buffy looked from Spike to the three strangers, meeting the eyes of each one in turn. Spike's were sulky, the Doctor's confident, and Martha's pleading. Jack winked at her. I have to decide. Do I trust a crazy vampire and three other even crazier people who apparently travel around in a box doing God knows what (although I can guess) or a man I dated for a year, who is such a Good Guy that even Spike calls him a Pillar of Rectaltube. She frowned. That last phrase didn't sound right, even in her head.
But then she thought back and remembered Riley saying, "It's vitally important we find the eggs whole so that we can study them. We already have some samples…"
Then she remembered Captain Jack saying, "The biological weapon the US government made got loose…"
Riley would not knowingly help the government make a horrible biological weapon. But the key word was "knowingly."
Buffy stepped away from the big box. "Okay," she said, hoping she was making the right decision.
It was hard to imagine the three people who managed to get the eggs inside the box as Evil Villains. They had Unlikely Heroes written all over them. It was even harder to imagine how they managed to squeeze themselves and the box of eggs inside, but somehow they did, one at a time.
"Thank you, and I look forward to meeting you again." The Doctor smiled warmly.
"Is that likely?" asked Spike.
"Oh, about a 100 percent probability, I'd say, based on my personal experience."
Martha was beaming. "You really have helped a lot of people today."
Captain Jack was the last to pass through the blue door. "Much appreciated. And if you're ever in Cardiff--" An arm reached out, pulled him all the way inside, and the door shut firmly.
"Better step back," said Spike.
"What does it do?" Buffy let him pull her towards his bedroom as the box made a strange, rhythmic noise and disappeared. "Okay, so that's what it does."
Spike was regarding her cautiously. She was regarding him with exasperation.
"Trying to impress me?"
"Yeah." He added slowly, "Mind, the way he asked, it felt impossible to refuse. It was as if I’d told him myself exactly what to say to make me go steal those eggs for him."
Buffy’s qualms returned. "And that doesn’t strike you as suspicious?"
Thus began an argument, which ended as most of their arguments did, with some very satisfying orgasms.
Buffy must have fallen asleep, because the next thing she knew she was waking up to the sound of boots tramping and soldiers yelling. She sat up in bed, saw who was standing at the bottom of the ladder that led to the main floor of the crypt, and snatched a sheet up over her naked torso. "Uh, hi, Riley."
Spike rolled over and gazed blearily at Riley. "Bugger. Another pogrom. Do me a favor and don't break my telly again. And hands off the porn."
Riley stood still as soldiers ran past him toward the sewer passages. Another was poking around among the skulls and the bottles in Spike's bar. At last he said, "I didn't expect this."
"Hey, I'm not the Spanish Inquisition!" protested Spike. When the others stared at him blankly, he muttered, "Bloody Philistines."
Buffy suddenly felt a surge of anger at her ex-boyfriend to go with the permanent undercurrent of annoyance she felt for her current one. "Maybe you never did really understand me, Riley." She yelled at the soldiers, "You won't find the eggs. They're not here!"
"We'll check for ourselves," said Riley grimly.
"Of course you will," agreed Spike.
"The Bio-weapons guys are going to be pissed if we come back empty-handed," one of the soldiers commented to Riley.
"Your weapons guys may just have to accept their eggs may have been omeletized," said Buffy, suddenly certain she had made the right choice.
"All the kings’ horses," agreed Spike.
Buffy pulled the sheet over her head and tried to pretend she wasn't there as the soldiers searched the crypt. Spike sat up in bed next to her, smoked a cigarette, and muttered curses. At last, only Riley was left, and Buffy peeked out from under the covers, sitting up to meet his glare.
"I know he had those eggs, Buffy." Riley gestured at Spike, who responded with an annoying little wave and a puff on his cigarette.
Buffy shrugged. "Well, maybe he also knows someone who could dematerialize them so you couldn't find them."
Riley shook his head, gave her an "I'm very disappointed in you," look, and left.
Buffy fell back on the pillows. "Well, all's well that ends, I suppose."
"It sodding well isn't!" growled Spike.
"What's wrong with you? They didn't smash your TV or take your porn. And I really don't think Riley's going to be visiting me ever again."
"No, but the bloody Doctor didn't pay me for the eggs!"
The End