FIC: Footnotes (Doctor Who, River/Doctor; PG-13)

[tellitslant]

Title: Footnotes
Author: tellitslant
Fandom: Doctor Who
Pairing: River/Doctor
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 2400
Disclaimer: BBC. Transformative work. Etc.
Warnings: none
Summary: In prison, every moment of River's time is controlled. All she has is her past.


Not since she was a young child has River lived so long in one place, all in order by the clock. In Stormcage, bells sound every hour; the guard changes every six; the lights rise and dim at the same time every day. River goes from her cell to the exercise yard and back again. Her life had been all of time and space; now it is a metal corridor, and their eyes are always watching.

River's only escape is her diary.

Curled up on her thin mattress, she flips through the crumpled pages, reliving her favourite pieces of her past. Sometimes she chooses a date and reads forward in order. Sometimes she jumps around in her own timeline, trying to see things as the Doctor must have. Tonight she lets the book fall open where it will, pages settling on either side of one of the many cracks in its spine.

("Is that how you find the good bits?" the Doctor had asked her once, half-joking.

They were sitting in a room in the TARDIS they'd both just discovered for the first time – a cozy den, complete with plush couches and a crackling fire. River was updating her diary between sips of an excellent Kozanian clover wine while the Doctor watched, nursing a reddish drink he wouldn't let her taste, claiming it could permanently affect her ability to shield her mind from psychic trauma.

"Good bits?" River grinned lazily and stretched her feet out across the cushions, prodding his thigh with her bare toes. "It's all good bits, sweetie."

A shadow passed quickly over the Doctor's face; then he forced it away and set his drink down. "You know what I mean," he protested, waving his hands. "The good bits, the, the – "

"Oh, you mean like this?" River asked, opening the book and clearing her throat to read aloud. "'Dear diary, marvellous night tonight. Had a little too much to drink and got lost exploring the TARDIS. Worked out for the best, though – Himself looked handsome by firelight, so I took advantage of his drunken state and shagged him senseless.'"

"'Himself'?" The Doctor looked momentarily disconcerted. "Do you actually call me – wait a moment, I don't remember that, when did that happen?" He craned his neck to peer at the book and River turned it around, showing him the blank page.

Holding his eyes, she deliberately bent the covers back until the spine cracked gently in her hands. Closing the book, she tossed it over the back of the couch. "I'll have to remember to write it up tomorrow," she whispered, grabbing his braces and pulling until he settled on top of her.

She kissed him chastely once, twice, then opened to him. The remnants of the strange liquor on his tongue burned her lips, sending prickles of heat across her skin, and she hissed.

"Bolkusii whiskey," the Doctor murmured into her ear. "Not for the faint of heart. Or mind. But I'm not actually drunk, you know," he said, pulling back to look at her seriously.

"I don't care," she replied, tugging him back down to her. He pushed her shirt aside and ran his tongue over her collarbone, then moved lower, unbuttoning as he went. She twined her fingers in his hair and stretched deliciously, squirming under his mouth.

After a moment, he popped back up. "Handsome byfirelight?" he asked. River's eyes shot open. "Only by firelight, or, say, exceptionally handsome by firelight?"

"Doctor!" River grabbed him by the shirtfront and rolled them over, straddling his hips, her skirt settling over them both. She shrugged out of her shirt and leaned forward. "Shut up," she suggested.

He did.)

Alone on her bed, River shivers, tracing her own fingers across the bare skin of her shoulder and the curve of her neck. Her cell is brightly lit, no dark corners to hide in, but in her memory shadows dance in the firelight.

Her supper comes, and she turns to put the book away; a piece of paper falls out, unnoticed. She spoons up the tasteless nutrient mush, nibbles the corner off a reconstituted protein bar, and washes it all down with the red-tinted water that's drawn up from the planet below. She expects to taste iron when she drinks it; it's room temperature and runs down her throat like blood.

When they take the tray, she sees the paper she dropped earlier and dives for it before the guard's boots can leave a print. She smoothes it out as best she can – it's blurred and faded, but she can make out her name, or the name she was using at the time, and a seat assignment. It's a shuttle ticket for a trip that was supposed to be a quick inter-planetary hop.

River smiles. Supposed to be, but wasn't.

("No, but you really need to see it to believe it," she said, leaning in and lowering her voice. "I don't want to give too much away; I simply can't bear to spoil the surprise!" She gave a tinkling laugh, gratified to see her companion's eyes flicker from her cleavage to the brilliant ruby necklace she wore and back again before settling on her face. Target acquired.

"But, Callie." Penelope clutched River's hands. River covered a grimace, silently swearing never to pick a pseudonym with potential diminutives again, and squeezed back. "What if someone else has started digging? You have to tell me everything so I can make a decision as soon as we get there!"

The passenger across the aisle was staring. River laid a finger on Penelope's lips, quieting her. "I could never do it justice, my dear. Trust me, I'll show you everything once we're there together," she promised throatily.

Penelope pouted at her, but sank back in her seat. River allowed herself to relax marginally, running through the plan in her head. The property was on an island; she hadn't been lying about the views, which should take care of Penelope's reservations by themselves. If not, she'd salted the ground with enough gems to ensure that greed would overcome good sense. Then she just needed to make sure she was around when the mining equipment broke through to the subterranean tunnels and she could nip in, grab the artefacts, and be gone. She gave Penelope a genuine smile, causing the other woman to blush. It should be a nice, straightforward job.

There was a snap, and a shriek, and the shuttle jolted sideways. Penelope grabbed River's hand again and the shuttle attendants darted forward into the cockpit. River thought she smelled smoke.

She tugged her hand from Penelope's and unsnapped her belt, intending to run back and check the engines. The moment she was up, the shuttle gave another lurch. River slammed into a seat back and nearly collapsed to the ground, but a strong pair of arms caught her, keeping her upright.

"Whoops, there we go, better take your seat again," her supporter said.

"The engines," she started, turning, then her mouth dropped open in shock. "Doctor?"

"River!" He blinked at her. "What are you – " The shuttle shuddered and he steadied her easily. "Wait, no time, there's a section of space up ahead that's just gone solid and I think there's a black hole forming right across the way. Odd, isn't it?" He gave her a manic grin and rushed past, bullying his way through the attendants.

"Stuck between a rock and a hard place," River mused, watching him go. "Isn't that just typical."

"Callie? What's going on?" Penelope called plaintively.

"Not now, dear," River said. Twirling the screwdriver she'd lifted from the Doctor's pocket, she turned and went below to see how much more speed she could coax out of the engines.)

River tucks the slip of paper back into the diary and laughs; the sound echoes weirdly against the concrete walls of the prison. A guard, passing by, turns and looks at her. She arches an eyebrow and looks back evenly, her face falling into the familiar blank lines that are a prisoner's only defense. He lingers just long enough to peer into every corner of the cell, and when he leaves, laughter is the last thing on her mind.

It's getting late; River can feel the prickle of tiredness beginning behind her eyelids. Her lights will go out soon, but it's never actually dark in prison. The corridors are always lit regardless of what time it is, so the guards know where to put their boots as they clatter past on their rounds.

River misses the dark, she finds. It's harder to hide in the light, but she manages it; still, she misses the shadows, the way they make everything softer, somehow, and so much more surprising.

She leans back against the wall, letting the chill bleed into her skin, and opens her diary again, deciding to use the rest of her day as best she can.

(It was dark in the museum lab, the only light spilling from the bench where River was working. Brush in hand, she bent over the fragment on her workspace, spreading miniscule amounts of solution onto the pottery and letting it etch away the patina that has accumulated over the years. Every few minutes she switched off the light and waited for the dark to reveal its secrets, then switched it back on and kept working.

She finished painting another square centimetre, switched off the light, and waited.

"It's very dark in here, isn't it?" a voice said from beside her left ear. River jumped, barely managing not to knock over her jar of solution.

The light switched back on. "Sorry," the Doctor said, not sounding remotely apologetic. River glared at him, pointedly moving her tools out of his reach. He ignored her, leaning over the bench until his nose was an inch from the pottery fragment. "You missed a spot," he said after a moment.

"I'm not done yet!" River snapped, then took a breath and reined in her annoyance. "Thanks," she added drily.

"Any time," he replied, brushing his finger along the jagged edge of the fragment. River bit back a warning. "How long have you been working on this piece?" he asked, pulling back.

"Not that long," River replied defensively. She straightened to meet his gaze and her back cracked loudly, spine realigning after hours of hunching over. She winced. "I may have lost track of time."

"And what are you looking for?" he asked mildly.

River couldn't resist lighting up with excitement as she took the shard gently in her hand. "There's a phospholuminescent bio-reactive decal on top of the paint," she explained. "It's been hidden over the years by misguided attempts at restoration. But if I can remove the layers of resin without affecting the decal, I should be able to find out what it means." She smiled, pushing a strand of hair off her forehead with the back of her hand. "It's just starting to recharge enough to glow. See?" She switched off the light and watched with pride as the shard started to fluoresce.

"Ah, very nice," the Doctor said in the darkness. "Kyrdonian, third dynasty, right?" He turned the light back on to see River nod. "Sooo, why don't you just come with me? We'll hop back, take a look at the original, save you all this guesswork!" He spread his arms wide and beamed as if he'd just given her the greatest gift in the universe.

She watched his careless gesture nearly knock over the solution she'd spent forty-five minutes mixing. "Ah... no," she replied curtly, sitting back down on her stool.

"What? But why not?" the Doctor exclaimed. "Kyrdon has some of the best street food in the galaxy in that era! Not to mention entertainment! I know how you love seeing period plays in their original period," he wheedled. "Wouldn't you rather be doing that than... this?"

River swiveled around and stood up quickly, causing him to take a step back. "No," she said. "No, I would not rather be flitting around the universe with you. I would rather be right here, doing my job."

She shook her head. "You don't understand, do you?" she said softly, watching the confusion on his face. "It's not about the knowing. It's always about the knowing, for you. You work in absolutes. It's about the finding out, for me." She smiled. "The process is part of the fun. You've never understood that. But you will."

"I – I will?" The Doctor blinked, taken aback. "When?"

"You will. Eventually." River patted him fondly on the shoulder, then turned him around and gave him a little shove. "Now, shoo. If you really want to go somewhere, come back in two days. I'll have time for you then."

"Two days?" The Doctor pouted over his shoulder. "But that's forever!"

"Doctor, don't even pretend you're not going to step in the TARDIS and go forward two days right now," River pointed out.

"Well, yes," he admitted, "but it'll still take longer than if you came with me now."

"Two days, Doctor," River said, escorting him out of the lab and closing the door behind him. She returned to her bench, smiling, and picked up her brush.

"Sorry," the Doctor said from behind her. "TARDIS is actually that way. Are you sure you don't – "

"Two days," she repeated, concentrating on a bit of fiddly brushwork.

"Right. Two days. I'll be off then. Okay."

River rolled her eyes as he left, but didn't look up. She had a deadline now, after all. Two days would be a push, to get this done, but she could manage it. She had somewhere to be.)

A rumble of thunder startles River out of her thoughts; outside her window, the storm has picked up, the ever-present rain rattling against the metal exterior of the prison. She will not sleep tonight, not in a downpour this heavy. The pounding rain reminds her too much of gunfire.

She runs a finger across the fading lines, savoring the rough texture of the handmade paper. It's been – how long? – since she had anything new to write in here. Her hands itch for a pen, a chance to watch the ink feather across the paper. Even if she had anything to write, she's not allowed sharp objects. They think they know her so well, here, in Stormcage.

In the corridor, a phone rings. She barely notices the guard tromp across to answer it. "Cell forty-six," he says, and then, "The Doctor?"

Her head snaps up.