Yowzah Oneshot Collection (1)

89(M)

She lucked out.

The room smelled like it’d been cleaned a mere two days ago, a vast improvement in River’s mind as she set the small clutch she carried on the wobbly dresser. No used condoms, no roaches, and the sheets were only somewhat threadbare. She toed her trainers off, shrugged out of her jacket, but kept her gun strapped. Tally marks decorated her arms like some sort of odd tribal tattoo. She turned her wrists, whispering under her breath as she added them up. Not like she hadn’t done so when she first noticed them, but she always took a final count.

She sat on the edge of the bed, testing the mattress both for comfort and any hidden rat nests. She vastly preferred spacious penthouses and luxurious spas, but this trip required her to remain a bit more low-key. That left seedy motels, paid in cash. As soon as they were done, she was making the Doctor drag them all to a resort planet. They would need it. She would need it. Tucking the day’s number - 46 - in the back of her mind, River flopped back on the mattress. She closed her eyes, breathed deep, and let the weariness overtake her.

She knew what the Doctor was doing, she had to let him do it. He was concocting something, and whatever it was would finally, finally eradicate the Silence. The older version of him had promised her this, a long, long time ago under a sky full of stars so bright and numerous that the vision would be forever seared in her mind. “Trust me,” he told her, and she did. Implicitly. Completely. Always.

Still, it was a secret she had to bear alone. She hadn’t seen her Doctor since the night before she’d gotten the blue envelope with the “2” embossed on it. It’d been six weeks of linear time since that day, when she was forced to watch her younger self shoot him in the Teselecta. It’d been surreal, like watching a movie. Her memories of the event as her younger self were so muddied that she hadn’t even been aware that they were in Utah. The only thing she really remembered from the alternate timeline was the confrontation with the Doctor at Area 52. She remembered gunshots, being submerged in water, then being arrested and thrown in Stormcage.

Which reminded her …

River rolled off the bed and checked the bathroom. She sighed at the claw-footed bathtub. “I asked for a shower,” she muttered. She hated baths. She tried, after the shooting, to take them. The feeling of being surrounded by water caused a panic attack. She swam only when absolutely necessary, using every ounce of her self control to push the screaming to the back of her mind.

There was nothing to be done. She’d secured the last room at this particular motel outside of Pennsylvania’s capital city, and she would have to go into the city itself to find another. She was saving that for in the morning.

She walked out to find the Doctor trying to break in through the window.

“Oh, honey,” she breathed and strode over to the small square of dirty, paint-splattered glass. This one opened via a crank, and she managed to get it open a crack. Cool night air swept the musty smell from the room, and she peered down at the Doctor through the screen. “Hello, sweetie. What are you doing out there?”

“Sneaking in. Open that up further.”

“Honey, I can’t. Go around to the door like a normal person.”

“It defeats the point of sneaking in if I go through the door.”

“I’m sure you can sneak in quietly.” Which, River thought, was rather like saying that a horse could creep through a china shop without breaking anything. Before he could protest, River leaned on the crank and closed the window, then began unpacking her bag.

It took about five minutes and a couple of shrieks, and the Doctor burst through the door carrying a greasy paper bag. “Sorry!” he yelled out, slammed the door behind him and scowled. “He,” he said, jerking his thumb at the wall to the room on their left, “thought I was there to um … service him.”