trans_9 | Prepraring for Molly

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Prepraring for Molly

River was in a dark, mysterious place. A place that no one had been inside for centuries. She was in...the TARDIS Storage area. It was sort of like the attic of the TARDIS, where the Doctor had crammed all of his old stuff that had fallen out of use. Not to mention the TARDIS sometimes dropped off stuff from previous companions here as were. She was rooting through piles of dusty objects, slowly and steadily moving them out of her way so she could access some of the harder to reach areas of the storage room.

"There it is!" The Doctor's old cot. Oh, she had some memories with this one. Seeing it again brought a pain to her chest. A pang for something...

Several minutes later, she could be seen hauling that dusty old baby cot down from the storage area. "Let's get you cleaned up."

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Right, so everyone was back to normal, there was even a baby -- quiet one, wasn't she? Molly wass almost too well-behaved -- and okay, so Jamie's paradox was still a problem but at least all the humans were accounted for and it didn't sound like anyone blipped out of existence. All in all, it'd been a good day.

And then there was River.

River Song, archaeologist, intergalactic woman of mystery with the keys to his hearts (or at least his real name. And the TARDIS. And his future) and she was probably somewhere in the TARDIS, judging by the way that handstand had clearly been fussed with two inches to the right or the fact that lever on the console wasn't set into the same position he'd left it in. Frowning, the Doctor set out to find River. For all he knew, she could be organizing the place when he hadn't quite got the chance to tell her that he'd left those socks hanging on the mantle for a very specific, very important reason, and all she needed to know was not to touch them, thank you.

Working his way through the north door -- relative north, fine -- from the console room, the Doctor eventually found River outside the storage area. All he had to do was follow the sounds of wood scrapping along the floor, and it wasn't just any old wood. The Doctor rounded the corner and stared. River Song. His cot. Faded TARDIS blue and what had once been a rich gold color; chipped now and it hadn't seen the light of day in...well.

He couldn't quite remember. The Doctor came up short.

"River, if you're expecting, you ought to say something," he said, his voice level. Probably too level but he couldn't quite sort out if he was cross she was touching his cot or wondering how she could even know about it. "Any particular reason you're dragging that cot around?"

Edited 2011-06-13 10:45 (UTC)

By the time the Doctor finds her, River is wiping down the dusty old Gallifreyan cot with a wet cloth. Cleaning away dusts and cobwebs. She's so preoccupied that she doesn't even notice his presence until he speaks. When her head turns to look at him from her spot, kneeling on the ground, it's like she's snapped out of a trance. She'd been a bit off ever since she'd seen Rory holding Molly. A baby girl that was supposed to have been her. A baby girl who would get to have the childhood she'd never and could never have - and still there were other memories with this cot. Possibly a child, her own child, the Doctor's child. Things she didn't want to remember were haunting her eyes.

Still, she puts on a brave smile and rolls her eyes at him. "Not likely. You never come around for conjugal visits at the Storm Cage." She laughs and shakes her head at the same time. "Maybe someday." She murmurs as her fingers trace his name, written into the side of the cot. "Molly is going to need a cot and naturally, I thought of this old thing. We really should give it a fresh coating of paint."

The Doctor's eyes flick from the cot to River and it's one of those rare times where he's not fidgeting or having to fuss with something -- instead he's gone almost unnaturally still at the sight of the cot, at the old weathered stars and the little worn whorl in the wood that's probably been there since before humans decided it was a brilliant idea to start throwing pointed sticks at each other.

"Half the time I can't tell if you've escaped again or you're still there for the free food," he says. He frowns at her, still not entirely sure what to make of this and it's probably for the best he's kept on the wrong foot.

After all, that cot is deeply personal.

It's not just any old thing he'd bring out. Most of his companions don't even know about it. He supposes sometimes it's easier to believe he's always been the Doctor, that he'll always be and he's a constant, like your planet being firm under your feet and not destined for getting wiped out by solar flares. Humans are rather funny that way. They always did have a habit of not looking that far ahead. Too scary, he guesses. The Doctor steps forward and puts a hand almost possessively on the head of the cot, running his fingers along the cracks in the wood.

"All you had to do was ask. How did you know about this?" It's a good idea, a cot for Molly the baby clone...whatever she is. It's so good idea he might as well have thought of it, except it still begs the question.

How could River Song know about his cot? He fixes her with one of those stares, his head cocked slightly to the side.

This cot obviously holds many memories for River. Even if she can't remember most of the earliest ones. Her childhood is still vague and spotty. If she concentrates, she thinks she could remember, but remembering brings back the pain. Those years of being lost, alone, of being treated like a weapon in a war that had never been real in the first place.

River is being strangely quiet for once. Instead of smiling, grinning, or leading him on with her usual teasing answers; she focuses on cleaning up the cot. Wiping down the side, her fingertips intimately trace the Gallifreyan symbols for his name. So focused on her task that she appears to be ignoring him. There's too much emotion and it's all in her eyes. Pain. Anguish.

"Oh Doctor, the Storm Cage security has long given up trying to keep me locked up inside. I practically have full run of the place. They know I always return." Standing, she wipes off the trinklets dangling from the top of the cot. Her fingertips slowly closing around one of the stars. It means something to her, obviously so as she pauses for a good long while. Yes, it appears River is very familiar with his cot. But how? Why?

"Doctor, I'm going to have to ask you not to ask me the question that's forming in your head. Just like I won't ask you." Completely avoiding his question of how she knows about the cot and cutting him off before he could ask if she had children of her own. Rory had already asked and it stirred up even worse memories.

Her hand finds his and she grips him tight for a moment. Squeezing his hand and avoiding his gaze. Wishing she could tell him, but knowing she couldn't. Keeping secrets was a double edged sword. "Rory and Amy will make good parents, don't you think? Molly is...very lucky." Except her voice is choked with emotion for some reason.

Clearly they've given up, the Doctor thinking the Storm Cage's grown incredibly lax to let a single prisoner have that much power. Waltzing in and out! It makes one wonder why River even comes back if it's more of a courtesy than anything else.

Maybe she wants to be there. It's a theory that's been looking more likely the longer he's come to know River and while normally he'd feel smug knowing he's right, all it does is open up more questions. It's not exactly normal prisoner behavior.

You'd have to feel incredibly guilty over what you did to come back willingly every time.

The Doctor stares across the cot at River, simply watching her and her every move...trying to read what she isn't telling him with words. There's loads you can try to find out by what someone isn't tell you, after all, and he knows very well now that what she does tell him is carefully selected. Cherry-picked out for him. Considering he's a Time Lord andhe saw the woman die, he thinks he can handle a bit more than the occasional harmless "spoiler". He wants to say she's human but...the way she's looking at that cot. Very few humans have seen that cot and that means -- no. No, she can't be a fellow Time Lord.

That's not the sort of thing you'd keep from another Gallifreyan, not after the Time War.

Not if you thought you were the last of your species in the universe.

"Very lucky," he agrees unhelpfully. The Doctor frowns at that slight catch in River's voice, his hand squeezing back automatically. He's not sure why. "I take it you've met her. I didn't know you were the baby sort."

It's deceptively neutral. Why wouldn't she answer a question about if she was even a mother? The silence is telling, he thinks, and yet she can't be who he thinks she is. The Doctor doesn't pull his hand out from under hers, not sure what to make of her reaction to the cot and the subject of Molly. Is it the baby thing? Or is it Molly's specific clone situation? Either way, this isn't a side of River he's seen much before. It's not quite on the same level as when she decided it was a brilliant idea to punch him and then kill herself, in that order. It's something else.

Edited 2011-06-14 10:46 (UTC)

Oh, they haven't gone lax. River is just a hard prisoner to keep locked up, especially when she has somewhere she needs to be. Nothing can hold her in that cage when the Doctor comes calling. The Storm Cage has top of the line security measures . It obviously houses the absolute worst in intergalactic prisoners. River is one special girl if she can just waltz in and out at her leisure. That's not to say she doesn't have help from time to time.

When he squeezes her hand, she looks up at him with the saddest blue eyes he could ever imagine. This version of the Doctor was used to seeing the tough-as-nails archaeologist. The one who would face any danger for him, who seemed to relish their terrifying adventures, who would lay down her life for him. Now, she seemed upset about something. Something to do with Molly.

"I met her, briefly. Even held her. She couldn't have been adopted by more loving parents." She sounded to sure of that, like she'd seen and experienced something similar first hand. Putting on a smile, she entwines her fingers with his. He could sense her pain, she knew it. He just didn't know what to make of it and that was okay, for now.

"I didn't have a perfect childhood." She says quietly. "When you're treated like a weapon your whole life....it doesn't make for a happy childhood. I was fighting a war before I even knew what war was." She sighs and withdraws her hand, leaning in to kiss him on the forehead. A tender gesture. Perhaps a thank you for listening to her. For not asking too many questions. "Molly will have a better life."

River Song, you couldn’t have thrown the Doctor more than you already have, even if you tried.

The Doctor stares back as River gives him a look that’s so open, in a way he’s never seen before, that it startles him. It’s almost the same look he woke up to when she handcuffed him for “his own good”, except it’s much more than that. The Doctor can feel this openness from River’s mind and he has to struggle not to give into the temptation to have himself a peak, not even a little one. He’s not used to seeing River in a mood like this, that’s for certain.

What she says next is out of the blue. He’s used to only tidbits of info about her, dropped whenever she feels is most appropriate and learning about her childhood is about as expected as her telling him how they met. The Doctor blinks at her. He takes in what she says. It doesn’t answer everything, but it’s already more than what she’s chosen to give him before, so that’s saying something when you think about it. Unfortunately, there’s been countless wars just on Earth and that’s not even counting the centuries after humanity moves out into the stars and joins the other aliens out there – it’s a glimpse of what River is, but even now it’s not enough to close in on the specifics.

“She will,” the Doctor says. He believes it too. Despite his misgivings about River, she’s a good judge of character: the Ponds will make brilliant parents. “River, you don’t have to be a weapon, you know. Whatever that war is, it’s highly likely it’s over.”

He still can’t tell if she was a parent. The way she reacted to the cot, to Molly? It seems to the Doctor like she might be, a parent from a long time ago. He thinks he recognizes that look. But if she did have children, it’s past-tense, like his, and it would explain that old hurt he sees in her face. He doesn’t pull away from the kiss, his hands still resting on the head of the cot.

"Oh sweetie, you said that to me a long time ago and if anyone could make me believe it, it's you, but I'm always going to be a weapon. I can't be passive like you. Not when I see pain and suffering. You respond by trying to heal the hurt, trying to better things and I - well....best not to get into it." There were so different and yet eerily similar. Maybe he felt drawn to her for reasons he couldn't explain. Despite her penchant for wielding weapons. River certainly was an enchanting, mysterious woman. She'd helped shed some light on her past though, why she was always armed.

"I don't like to remember that far back. I like to think my life began when you dropped in out of the sky. You healed me in ways you don't yet know, Doctor." Pulling back from him, she fluffs his bangs. "And I healed you. Some of your hurts, anyway. At least, I like to think so."

Glancing back at the cot, she takes a step back and leans in to examine it. "Looks clean enough, wouldn't you say? I'd like to paint it, restore it a bit. If you want to help..."

In a way, it's gratifying to find out that the future him hasn't changed so much that he wouldn't try to steer River down a more...well, he doesn't quite want to say "productive" path, but anything other than "living weapon" path would just about do it.

In retrospect it seems blindingly obvious River had some unknown military training. He's not sure how he missed it before.

It's always startling to hear the people he's met describe him, the Doctor raising an eyebrow as River describes her early life. Does he think he deserves it? Not entirely, not by a long shot, and hearing River describe him as a sort of healer is exactly the sort of thing to throw him doubly on the wrong foot. At this rate he's going to run out of feet. But he suspects she's right in some areas: if he knew her well enough to tell her his real name, then it's possible she knew the...other things. Things he wasn't proud of. Ugly things he never told his companions.

He's never quite trusted anyone that far. It's been so long he almost forgets at times what it felt like.

The Doctor reaches up without thinking to fuss his hair back into shape.

"Well," he says, not quite sure how to react to River being so dangerously close to open with him. "Nothing like a nice bit of fresh air and friends to do that for you," he reaches out and gives her a pat on the hand that's more grandfatherly than anything else -- a remind that he's still a divergence himself from River's timeline.

He turns to follow her attention back to the cot, glad to have something to focus on that isn't the horde of questions she's just dumped in his lap. The Doctor will be up all night now, thanks to Doctor Song. "We'll have to find paint. Best bet is probably the City, see if anyone has anything in TARDIS blue and gold."

River is excellent at that. Keeping the Doctor up all night. In many more ways then he could ever imagine. When he pats her on the hand, she leans in to kiss the corner of his lips. Not so chaste. As quickly as she gave that kiss, she pulled away before he could even flail.

"I'll make a trip later and see what I can find. Then you can paint it for me." As swiftly as she'd opened up to him, she was once again on her guard. The sharing session was apparently over and who knows when he would get another chance.

"What do you think of Molly? I know you speak baby a bit better then you speak otter." What doesn't she know about him? Perhaps that's the ultimate question.

Quick as that kiss is, the Doctor still manages a tiny bit of a half flail, pulling back startled and his eyes wide as a saucers, flabbergasted a second time over. His mouth works as he blinks at her. Even touches the edge of his mouth as if probing for any lipstick and it's clear he hasn't been kissed in quite that way in awhile...well, excepting Amy's attempt which was less attempt and more Let's Jump the Doctor And Something About Life and Death Situations.

The Doctor tries to recover from his surprise before he lets River get the better of him (again), clearing his throat and pretending quite badly that it's every day he gets kissed and it's not a big thing, nope, not at all. He busies himself fussing with his jacket and then with an imaginary splinter hanging off his old thing of a cot.

"Fine, I've been meaning to clean her up anyway," the Doctor lies, shooting a look at River over the cot. "Molly? Lovely girl, going to be a bit of a drooler until she grows out of it. Other than that, she's...nice."

Very nice. But he has no idea what she'll be like when she grows up and finds out all about her past, so there's that. So he'll stick with "nice", which is open and not quite saying what he thinks because he can't predict Molly even five years from now.

River can't help it. That shocked and gawking, open-mouthed look on his face makes her laugh. It's a good feeling. She hasn't laughed in quite a while. Leave it to the Doctor to heal her when she's hurting the most, even if he doesn't realize what he's doing at the time.

"Sure you have, sweetie." She's still chuckling as he tries to recover. Noting how he fakes acting smooth and suave. Like he gets kissed everyday. Not likely. He's forgetting how well she knows him.

"Nice, that's good." She turns, looking away from him and walking over to shut the door to the storage area. She had the cot, that's all she'd intended on braving that dust ridden place for.

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Prepraring for Molly

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