Spring Cleaning, Round 2 [Backdated to just after podpop]

[fantastix]

Who: The Doctors, their assistants and friends, some visitors [Open], and the Master.
Where: The TARDIS, the blue police box located in the Hangar.
Summary: Somebody's made a mess of the old ship. The Doctors are very unhappy. Time to dig in and clean up! Also, there's some necessary hashing-out of titles and ownership between three men who happen to be the same person. And a bit of a problem arises...
Warnings: Possibly mild swearing on Nine's part.


The Doctor and his immediate successor with the long coat had run straight from the Observation Deck when they'd learned where the TARDIS was and gotten their bearings. They'd been whisked through the uncomfortable transport tubes, spilled into an arsenal of ships, and been left to search. Luckily, as diminished as their abilities were, they could still sense the old girl. It wasn't long before she was found.

They wasted no time in opening the door, winding up in a console room that could never fit inside the seemingly small exterior of the police box without some serious dimensional shifting. It was a wide space, well-lit, but definitely not the room the two new arrivals were used to.

Here, they'd finally find this other Doctor the other crew members have told them so much about. And with any luck, they'll have some answers too.

Comments

[makeherblue]

The Doctor passes off the cables to River - if she wants to join him in pretending to look busy, well, then by all means! He has the decency to give her one of those slightly baffled looks, the tips of his ears burning red as he coughs. "I take it that hasn't happened yet."

Two of him! Which ones? Obviously future ones, but this body or was this even further down his timeline? River has a terrible habit of dangling little tidbits of information in front of his face, almost casually, and it's another tiny piece of the larger puzzle here. She has to know that it's already complicated enough with their own timelines going in opposite directions, but with three of him here, that was triple complicated.

"How were things while I was at Kalimba?" The Doctor's tone is slightly too level. He hasn't told her about what happened with Sobek and with how he's filled out and gained weight again, he looks just as much as the same man as the one that left. Talking about Stacy is loads more interesting than what happened with the Crocodile God, at any rate, and it's another one of those experiences he'd rather not talk about.

[hullo_sweetie]

River loves it when his ears go all red like that. Let's be honest, if she isn't making him gasp, blush, or flail, the whole universe might come to an end! "Not yet. Although I'll admit having three of you here has it's draw backs. I'll be run ragged keeping you lot in line." As if she didn't have enough on her plate with just one Doctor to keep track of. Now she had multiple Doctors. There's a slight pause when he asks how things were. An odd pause, actually, considering the strange look that crosses over her face. It was there only a second or two before her smile fell back into place, "Uneventful, for the most part." She had noticed the change in him when he came back, but she knew he had these sort of moods from time to time.

[makeherblue]

Well! That would serve her right, having to be the one to chase after him for once! Hims. If you must be technical about it.

"You'll have to be three times as careful," he says, not thinking he needs to specify just what it is she'll have to watch herself about. She knows. At least she's careful about that, even River can't resist those teases here and there. He catches an odd little expression on her face just then, the Doctor tilting his head curiously. "Uneventful. Big robot attack on Stacy and you call it uneventful!"

He sounded half incredulous, half impressed. River Song, a woman who knows her adventures enough to be picky.

[hullo_sweetie]

River does tend to look after him, especially on board Stacy. She's going to need to clone herself at this rate because honestly there were just too many Doctors floating around and that's not something she thought she would ever think, let alone say.

"Yes, I'm aware. You can't deny me a little tease here and there. I do so love how young your other regenerations are." There she goes again, calling Ten and Nine young when they're several times her age, more then likely.

"Well, I have rebooted the universe with you, most other things tend to pale in comparison."

[makeherblue]

The Doctor grins at River. It's pretty hard to top rebooting the universe, although he would think that only makes it a challenge to try anyway. "They probably don't know what to make of you."

He turns to plug in one of the cables to something inside the TARDIS that looks like it's an ex-toaster/dishwasher if they'd imploded, turning to take more cables from River. It's not immediately clear what he's up to right now, aside from enjoying River's company and pretending to look busy. He's not sure what Nine and Ten plan to do with the...bog situation, nevermind the man-eating library, but he supposes it's only a matter of time before they sort it out. And this. And he somehow gets River to her own time, once she gives him a clearer idea when she is. Come to think of it, she's been rather vague about that part...

"Still, I'd be careful. Three of me is dangerously brilliant, you know. They might be able to do quite a bit with your idea of 'teases'." He turns his back on River to drop to his hands and knees, poking at one of the cables.

[hullo_sweetie]

"Them? They're so young, like fumbling baby versions of the Doctor I know." River didn't mean it in a harsh way, although Ten might take it to mean as such, but it was just her way of comparing them all to that inevitable standard she had. "You're more like an awkward teenage version." She chuckles, stepping back to let him get to work, scrutinizing his methods. "But you're close. Very close."

The longer she stayed here with him, living out their lives in a linear fashion, the more he was beginning to learn about her. Bits and pieces, nothing that could ever make sense, but she knew he was suspicious after that body sharing incident. A normal human would have been damaged by housing a Time Lord brain, River suffered through it with nothing except the feeling of being tired constantly from the sensory overload.

"I've been keeping my spoilers for a long time now, Doctor. I know how to keep this from you..." Even if she'd rather not, it sounded like she was getting tired of this constant mystery surrounding her. It was possible she just wanted to be known. "Three of you."

[makeherblue]

"Flattered," the Doctor said dryly, with that almost amused smirk. How lovely to know he was "close" to this ideal Doctor of River's. The awkward teenage version. It has been so long that he only barely remembers his teenage years -- or maybe the fact was he remembered, he simply didn't think back to those times too much, aside from a general regret for what he had done and didn't do and what he wished he'd said.

He straightened to glance over at River. She was looking about as River Song as she usually did. He couldn't quite explain it: she just looked pure River, from the top of her excessive hair to the bottom of her toes and he wouldn't have it any other way. The secrets, now. Those he could do without. It was one thing to keep secrets from the humans. But he'd like to say he was a better judge of time travel and timey-wimey things than the average human and there were definitely some days where River's teases and half-teases drove him mad.

"So how long do you plan to keep them?" the Doctor suddenly switched course. "The spoilers and your teases."

He was still trying to picture them meeting in the first place.

[hullo_sweetie]

Except River guarded her secrets and spoilers specifically at his future self's orders. So at some point, his future self must have cared deeply about the events that would bring them together and didn't want their history to be changed. That's not to say she didn't enjoy holding all the cards in this whacky relationship they have, had, will have.

"Oh, until I think you're ready." She leans down and adjusts the cable, clearly finding his work to be unsatisfactory. Just like his driving. When she finishes, she stands and slides a hand through her curls, pushing some errant strands out of the way.

"Why? Don't tell me you're getting tired of trying to figure out who and what I am."

[makeherblue]

The Doctor had to resist the urge to stoop and un-adjust that cable, because it was there for a reason and this wasn't the same as braking stylishly.

"Until you think I'm ready - ?" The Doctor sputtered. He was actually at a loss for words, his mouth working soundlessly as he tried to come up with something that wasn't "you can't do that!" and "you're not the boss" and plenty more along those lines.

Give him a moment.

The Doctor frowns at her, one hand on his hip. "We're in what is essentially an alternate reality. Your future might not even happen here. If it's something that can help me help the others here, now, then I think you need to tell me."

Besides, there was a point where he was finished with dancing around flirting, when he was really would get tired of being fed what this archeologist thought he deserved to know.

[hullo_sweetie]

River laughs at his sputtering, really laughs. She laughs at his reactions towards her quite a lot. "Well like you said, Demon's Run isn't about to happen here, so I suppose I have to wait and see." She wasn't even quite sure why she bothered hiding her identity. He was nearly ready to know the truth. Still, it was hard to explain without certain events falling into place first.

Now he's frowning at her and she's grinning back at him. A fine couple they make! "Oh, but where would be the fun in that, sweetie?" She knew he was getting tired of their song and dance routine, so was she, so maybe soon she'd reveal herself. Maybe.

"It's nothing that can help the others, I assure you. My identity is, well, complicated."

[makeherblue]

Complicated might as well be River’s middle name. Or maiden name. Or some sort of name for her. She seems like the type of woman to need more names than the average person, almost like she could collect them like, say, stamps. Or war trophies. River Song doesn't strike him as much of a stamp collector -- not with that hair. Even her laugh as an aggressive quality to it, throaty and almost like a purr that he can't tell is on purpose or an unconscious thing.

Another Doctor Song question mark.

“Demon’s Run?” The Doctor frowns at her. The name seems familiar. Like he’s heard it before. Judging from her response he's supposed to have heard it before, only it's not pinging anything at all right this very second. "how do you know it won't help the others? This isn't either of our futures."

Which meant that the whole Laws of Time thing could be...bendy-wendy, basically! That and timey-wimey but saying bendy-wendy wibbly-wobbly timey-womey was far too much of a mouthful, even for him.