Yowzah Oneshot Collection (3)

82(G)

wherever I go, I wonder where I am in my relationship to you

                         leiascully

River Song is a sight to behold, body one taut line, bright eyes searching the smoking hulks of cybermen for any signs of life. The Doctor wonders if he's ever taken River to early Greece - surely Thrace would have loved her, and he can think of at least one sculptor looking for Nike.

"Well!" she says, bringing her gun arm back down to her side in a smooth motion. "Isn't this a lovely party you brought me to, sweetie."

The shawl she's been wearing slipped from her shoulders during the fracas; she bends to retrieve it. On each of her shoulder blades, he sees a symbol that almost blazes out at him in the dim of the basement. Two circular words, as familiar to him as his own name; on her left shoulder, she bears the Gallifreyan word for "journey" and on the right, the word "home". He feels a brief pang, as he usually does at the thought of his home world. The TARDIS is all the home he has now, and the Companions his only family. It's rare that that doesn't feel like enough, but he misses reading Gallifreyan sometimes, and he gets a secret thrill, seeing his language on her body.

"When did you get those tattoos?" he demands.

"Oh, years from now," she says. "A long time ago. You were there, sweetie - I think that's something you can know. And you took just the same tone about it, bless."

River drapes the shawl around herself again. It's only slightly worse for the wear. She still carries her little pistol out and ready. He isn't sure where she kept it, although speculating on a range of locations next to her warm skin sends a little frisson through him. Her eyes gleam and she grins; oddly enough, she probably does prefer a party where she gets to shoot people. He shouldn't like that, but somehow she makes it charming. Somehow she makes everything charming. It seems almost obscene how much he's enjoying life these days, with her at his side. Untoward, maybe. A man who is the last of his kind, who is responsible for unnumbered deaths, shouldn't be part of this sort of joy. And yet he can't help grinning back at her, his hearts thudding in his chest as if they've outgrown his rib cage.

Journey and home. How utterly apt; how very River. A totem for her and a message to him, for who else can read those glyphs? Journey and home, both on one person. Summed up in one person. How he has longed for home, and here it is in front of him. Amy's voice floats through his mind, a memory from the misadventure on the Byzantium: Is she going to be your wife one day then? She's entirely too clever sometimes, that Amelia Pond. It runs in the family.

"River," he says.

"Yes, sweetie?" she asks, idly scanning the room still. She picks her way through the metal corpses, perfectly balanced on her absurd shoes.

"I asked you once if you were married," he tells her.

"Will you have done?" she asks. "And what did I say?"

"Yes."

"Ah," she says. Her attention is still on the cybermen. She kicks one polished head experimentally. Nothing happens. She looks up at him, satisfied. "That doesn't sound like me, sweetie. I always figured myself for a free agent. Devoted, mind you, but The One was never going to ask, so I thought I'd save myself the heartache."

"The One?" he asks as she makes her way back to him.

"It's out of character, I know," she says in the light voice that she only uses when she's deadly serious. "River Song, destroyer of worlds, breaker of hearts, beholden to no one. But I gave my heart away, you see, long ago, so it was easy not to let it trouble me. It was a silly notion, anyway, The One." Her blue eyes are dark with thoughtful pain and the lingering thrill of battle. The smell of smoke clings to her curls.

"There was a question I didn't quite ask then," he says, gazing down at her.

"Spoilers," she tells him, her voice throaty and sweet.

"Not this time," he tells her. His palms are sweating - that's new - and he nervously wipes them on the seams of his trousers. "I'm the one back to front, this time. River, will you marry me?"

"Yes," she says immediately.

"I just thought," he goes on, rambling. "Hang on, did you say yes?"

"Yes."

He pauses. "So, hang on, that's yes to marrying me then, and not yes to me being back to front?"

"Yes."

"You really are a singularly frustrating individual," he tells her.

"I know, my love," she says tenderly. "You'll just have to live with that."

"In all the universe, and I have been around the universe, there's not a single other being as difficult as you. You are The One, in the whole of ever, who drives me completely mad, only sometimes it's in a good way, and I want you to keep on doing it," he says. Realization dawns. "Wait, so I'm The One too, then, your One? The One who makes you want to turn inside out with something you can't quite identify? The One who won't ever let you go even this person is always just out of reach?"

She laughs. "Well, it wasn't the Nestene duplicate, though I liked the swappable bits, and it certainly wasn't Jack Harkness, for all his charms."

He takes the hand that isn't holding the gun and holds it between his. "I'm sorry, River."

"What for, my love?" She smiles sweetly at him.

"For not having the eyes to see," he says. "For the pain I must have caused you. Even now, I should be telling you that I adore you, and I'm going on about the way you've got under my skin."

"Oh, I think we wound each other equally," she says. "And I like being under your skin. But these are the good times, honey, and we ought to make the most of them."

"You're right," he says. "Surely there's some sort of wedding planet. We'll go there at once." He pauses. "Good heavens, no wonder you had that expression. I made a complete mess of this."

"Ah well," she says, and leans around him and neatly takes out a wriggling piece of cyberman. "You may be an idiot, but you're my beautiful idiot, at least."

"You'll have to share me with the TARDIS," he reminds her.

"Oh, will I ever," she murmurs, tucking her gun into her clutch, which was the least interesting of the possibilities he considered. Still, nothing wrong with her aim.

"That was a good shot," he says, offering her his arm. "Have I mentioned I like it when you do that?"

"Yes, and it makes you feel deliciously dirty, doesn't it," she says.

"Did I say that?" he protests. "I didn't say that!"

"You didn't have to," she says, and he can only hope that there are lots of things he doesn't have to say, all the things he can't find words for, but she seems to read his face the same way he read the glyphs on her back.

"Let's go and have our own party," she says. "No cybermen this time. We'll make it last as long as ever we can, and the next time I see you, you remind me, eh? I know you hate to know the ending, but don't let me forget this, Doctor, because I don't know if you'll remember, the next time I see you. This may not have happened yet for you. Don't let me forget, no matter what order we're in."

"I won't," he promises, and if they both know he's lying, it's comfort enough for now. She links her arm through his.

"Home," she says, and he snaps his fingers, and into the TARDIS they go.