femslash ficathon fic
Oct. 14th, 2008 08:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rivendellroseAfter a few false starts and scrapped drafts, I finally finished my prompt for ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
dw_femslash last night. Yay!
For:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
purple_bug, who requested a cross-era meeting, wacky fun, and the quote "Destiny? Isn't that just a fancy name for blind chance?" I hope I didn't get too far off the mark, and my apologies for the delay! :)
Rating: About a PG-13/low-R, I'd say.
Title: Collisions
Characters: Ace, Romana.
Summary: Romana and Ace don't so much meet as collide. An explosion is bound to follow.
It just... wasn’t in Romana to say “You saved my life,” even though that was exactly what Ace had probably done. Of course she might have died if Ace hadn’t happened along - any alien species that looked more or less like automobile-sized squid with serrated edges on their tentacles was probably more interested in eating other species than sharing temporal engineering tips, and they had certainly made quick work of the tiny hopper Romana had been traveling in before she mistakenly landed on their rocky little world. She could have very well found her way out of the spot on her own, though, Romana told herself - Nitro-9 wasn’t the only solution to any problem, after all. It was just... convenient. Particularly if it came along with a brash and, she had to admit, rather attractive young woman who quite enjoyed playing the hero from time to time.
In any event, they both knew it was the truth, after all - why did it need to be said? Ace didn’t need to hear the words to know it happened.
As they picked their way through the pinkish sludge that remained of their former enemies, however, Romana did think it was probably a good idea to say “Thank you,” at least. Particularly since Ace had kindly offered her a lift.
“I was in the area,” Ace replied, waving off Romana’s attempt at politeness. “And you weren’t going to get far without a Tardis, were you? At least with me you’ll end up in the right universe. We can try for Gallifrey in the morning, if you’re up to it.”
“You shouldn’t have a vortex manipulator,” Romana told her, trying to sound stern.
“Yeah, and you shouldn’t tried to take on all those squid-things by yourself. Looks like we’re both flawed. Come on - I’ve got a place we can stay the night.”
The flat - on Earth, in London, which would not have been Romana’s first choice for a place of respite, but she could hardly complain at what was effectively charity - was small and crowded with books, laboratory equipment, and clothes. A baseball bat leaned against the couch, and it didn’t look so much like someone lived there as like someone stopped by every now and then on the way from one place to another, and never bothered much with what she left. Ace blushed and cleared away a small pile of dirty dishes and empty take-away containers from the empty crate that seems to serve as a coffee table.
“I’m not home much,” she admitted, looking embarrassed.
“I know the feeling,” Romana remarked wryly. Personally, she had always kept her own quarters - wherever she lived - scrupulously neat, but after traveling with the Doctor she’d learned to find a bit of clutter charmingly nostalgic, on occasion, and there was something about the gloriously free way that everything was shoved together here that she found oddly appealing. Or perhaps she was just a bit smitten - that was probably a more likely answer, in the end, Romana told herself.
Ace ordered takeaway curry - “I always crave it when I’m away,” she told Romana with an air of guilty pleasure - and then set to clearing the couch, mostly by tossing whatever is on it onto the floor on the other side of the room. Romana tried to help a bit - mostly to prove that she was not entirely as helpless as Ace seemed intent on believing - and ended up getting an embarrassed look from Ace when the pile of clothes she hands over turns out to have a bright turquoise-and-yellow striped bra on top. Cotton, Romana noted, not satin, and with no lace on it. Practical, but still somewhat whimsical. It suited Ace, but she still blushed brilliantly as she takes the pile, and she was careful to throw the next pile on top of it.
While they were close, Romana noticed that they were both covered in soot and ashes and dust. She could smell chemical smoke on Ace, and was sure that it was just as strong on her own clothes. There was also a particularly impressive smudge on Ace’s cheek, which Romana unthinkingly brushed off with her thumb. Ace looked almost shocked at the contact, and then grinned. “You’re a mess, too, you know. Here.”
Ace’s fingers seemed to quickly lose track of what they were meant to be doing, though. Rubbing gently over Romana’s cheekbone her fingers danced to the point of her chin... then up her jaw... over into her hairline, where Romana was fairly sure it was going to take actual washing to get rid of all the dirt, not just the soft, circular massaging of Ace’s fingertips. And then she leaned down, and closed the space between them with a gentle kiss, almost hesitant (although the idea of Ace hesitating to do anything was nearly absurd, from what Romana had seen of her so far). Any hesitancy that might have plagued that first press of lips vanished almost immediately thereafter, however, and Ace plunged into the kiss with the same wild abandon that she seemed to do everything.
“You’re... really going to need a shower to get rid of all that guck,” Ace murmured when they broke apart a moment later.
“Do we have time?”
“If we take a shower together...”
“Do we have time for that and getting cleaned up?” Romana asked pointedly, raising an eyebrow. She was smiling, though - she couldn’t help it.
Apparently Ace couldn’t, either - she grinned back at Romana. “The curry won’t be here for at least half an hour still. And if they’re early this once, they can go to hell for it.”
How Ace managed to maneuver them around the piles of clothes and assorted to the bathroom, while still kissing Romana fervently, and with only minimal mishap, Romana wasn’t sure, but she was quite grateful for the skill. By the time they got there, Ace’s leather jacket and Romana’s frock coat had both joined the other assorted clothing on the floor, and Ace had more than halfway unbuttoned Romana’s shirt. Ace pushed her up against the wall and slid her knee between the older woman’s legs, while Romana arched shamelessly against her thigh and twined her fingers in Ace’s hair, tugging out its ragged braid. The laughter started when Ace, eyes bright with mischief, pushed her shirt down her shoulders just far enough to pin both her arms at the elbow, then bent to lick down her neck and onto the rise of her breasts. After that, neither of them stopped laughing - giggling, even, and Romana couldn’t remember the last time she’d done that - until they didn’t have breath for it anymore, and were far too distracted to worry about whatever little awkwardness had remained between them.
They did eventually remember to turn on the water, but there was very little actual bathing involved. They were too busy exploring every inch of each other, teasing out every detail that differed between them and reveling in the surprise of similarity and disparity both.
When the doorbell rang, Ace exploded with laughter again.
“Just leave it!” she shouted through the door, while Romana giggled helplessly in the shower-stall. It was all so absurd... she just couldn’t seem to stop, and didn’t particularly care - it had been so long since she’d been with someone as entirely alive as Ace, and it felt so good to drink that in, after years of wandering alone. When Ace finally stepped out, wrapped in a towel that just barely fulfilled the requirements of Human modesty, and stuffed a handful of bills in the delivery-boy’s face, Romana ended up laughing so hard at the boy’s saucer-eyed expression that she had to flop down on the sofa, even though she was still dripping wet. Once the door was shut, Ace joined her there, and it was quite a while before they could stop laughing long enough to eat.
“D’you suppose this is destiny or something? You and I meeting up like we did, I mean,” Ace clarified later, as they shared a bowl of eggplant curry.
“There’s no such thing as destiny,” Romana rebuked her gently.
“Oh, come on. You’re a Time Lord. You’ve got to believe in destiny - isn’t that what you all are supposed to be protecting? The way the universe is ‘supposed’ to go - that’s just another word for destiny.”
“No.” Romana poked around in the bowl with her chopsticks, neatly fished out a bamboo shoot and popped it into her mouth. “Time Lords defend the stream of time - we aren’t supposed to control where it’s going.”
“Tell that to the Professor...”
“Unless someone or something is already interfering with it,” Romana finished pointedly. “Then we’re allowed to intervene, to restore the status quo, or to... push things in a direction that allows more freedom for that species to develop as it naturally would. I may disagree with the Doctor on a lot of subjects, but I don’t disagree, for the most part, with te way he interferes with other species. Stopping the Daleks from destroying some planet, or keeping one species from completely subjugating another... that’s completely different from what I’m talking about. No, that’s not destiny. Destiny is just a fancy name for blind chance.”
“Sure, I suppose. Makes it sound so boring, though.” Ace leaned on her elbow with a thoughtful expression. “Like nothing matters, like it’s all just... meaningless.”
“Destiny’s what’s boring - acting like there’s only one possible way the universe can go, predetermined from the first instant of time. There’s nothing boring about blind chance.” Romana dug out another bamboo shoot and held it out for Ace, who nipped it off the chopsticks with a mischeivous wink.
“Sure...”
“There isn’t, though,” Romana insisted. Ace might not welcome a lecture, but it felt important to her at that moment to be properly understood by this Human. “The universe is built on chance. Everything - the stars, the solar systems, every living cell and ever complex molecule. All of it comes out of chance, in the end. An endless stream of order building itself out of chaos, and chaos arising out of order. All of it down to pure quantum chance, happening at the universal level. We’re not pieces in a puzzle that can only fit together one way, Ace. We’re tumbling atoms - quarks, even - zipping every which way through space-time... and sometimes we collide.”
“Like us.” Ace grinned brilliantly.
“Like us,” Romana agreed. “You never know what will come out of a collision like that.”
“Something good.” It wasn’t a question. Ace didn’t question things like that, Romana thought. She caused things - she was a catalyst, a bringer of fire and spark. Collisions and explosions and one path veering off sharply into another.
“This time? Yes, I’d definitely have to say it’s something good.”
dw_femslash last night. Yay! For:
purple_bug, who requested a cross-era meeting, wacky fun, and the quote "Destiny? Isn't that just a fancy name for blind chance?" I hope I didn't get too far off the mark, and my apologies for the delay! :)Rating: About a PG-13/low-R, I'd say.
Title: Collisions
Characters: Ace, Romana.
Summary: Romana and Ace don't so much meet as collide. An explosion is bound to follow.
It just... wasn’t in Romana to say “You saved my life,” even though that was exactly what Ace had probably done. Of course she might have died if Ace hadn’t happened along - any alien species that looked more or less like automobile-sized squid with serrated edges on their tentacles was probably more interested in eating other species than sharing temporal engineering tips, and they had certainly made quick work of the tiny hopper Romana had been traveling in before she mistakenly landed on their rocky little world. She could have very well found her way out of the spot on her own, though, Romana told herself - Nitro-9 wasn’t the only solution to any problem, after all. It was just... convenient. Particularly if it came along with a brash and, she had to admit, rather attractive young woman who quite enjoyed playing the hero from time to time.
In any event, they both knew it was the truth, after all - why did it need to be said? Ace didn’t need to hear the words to know it happened.
As they picked their way through the pinkish sludge that remained of their former enemies, however, Romana did think it was probably a good idea to say “Thank you,” at least. Particularly since Ace had kindly offered her a lift.
“I was in the area,” Ace replied, waving off Romana’s attempt at politeness. “And you weren’t going to get far without a Tardis, were you? At least with me you’ll end up in the right universe. We can try for Gallifrey in the morning, if you’re up to it.”
“You shouldn’t have a vortex manipulator,” Romana told her, trying to sound stern.
“Yeah, and you shouldn’t tried to take on all those squid-things by yourself. Looks like we’re both flawed. Come on - I’ve got a place we can stay the night.”
The flat - on Earth, in London, which would not have been Romana’s first choice for a place of respite, but she could hardly complain at what was effectively charity - was small and crowded with books, laboratory equipment, and clothes. A baseball bat leaned against the couch, and it didn’t look so much like someone lived there as like someone stopped by every now and then on the way from one place to another, and never bothered much with what she left. Ace blushed and cleared away a small pile of dirty dishes and empty take-away containers from the empty crate that seems to serve as a coffee table.
“I’m not home much,” she admitted, looking embarrassed.
“I know the feeling,” Romana remarked wryly. Personally, she had always kept her own quarters - wherever she lived - scrupulously neat, but after traveling with the Doctor she’d learned to find a bit of clutter charmingly nostalgic, on occasion, and there was something about the gloriously free way that everything was shoved together here that she found oddly appealing. Or perhaps she was just a bit smitten - that was probably a more likely answer, in the end, Romana told herself.
Ace ordered takeaway curry - “I always crave it when I’m away,” she told Romana with an air of guilty pleasure - and then set to clearing the couch, mostly by tossing whatever is on it onto the floor on the other side of the room. Romana tried to help a bit - mostly to prove that she was not entirely as helpless as Ace seemed intent on believing - and ended up getting an embarrassed look from Ace when the pile of clothes she hands over turns out to have a bright turquoise-and-yellow striped bra on top. Cotton, Romana noted, not satin, and with no lace on it. Practical, but still somewhat whimsical. It suited Ace, but she still blushed brilliantly as she takes the pile, and she was careful to throw the next pile on top of it.
While they were close, Romana noticed that they were both covered in soot and ashes and dust. She could smell chemical smoke on Ace, and was sure that it was just as strong on her own clothes. There was also a particularly impressive smudge on Ace’s cheek, which Romana unthinkingly brushed off with her thumb. Ace looked almost shocked at the contact, and then grinned. “You’re a mess, too, you know. Here.”
Ace’s fingers seemed to quickly lose track of what they were meant to be doing, though. Rubbing gently over Romana’s cheekbone her fingers danced to the point of her chin... then up her jaw... over into her hairline, where Romana was fairly sure it was going to take actual washing to get rid of all the dirt, not just the soft, circular massaging of Ace’s fingertips. And then she leaned down, and closed the space between them with a gentle kiss, almost hesitant (although the idea of Ace hesitating to do anything was nearly absurd, from what Romana had seen of her so far). Any hesitancy that might have plagued that first press of lips vanished almost immediately thereafter, however, and Ace plunged into the kiss with the same wild abandon that she seemed to do everything.
“You’re... really going to need a shower to get rid of all that guck,” Ace murmured when they broke apart a moment later.
“Do we have time?”
“If we take a shower together...”
“Do we have time for that and getting cleaned up?” Romana asked pointedly, raising an eyebrow. She was smiling, though - she couldn’t help it.
Apparently Ace couldn’t, either - she grinned back at Romana. “The curry won’t be here for at least half an hour still. And if they’re early this once, they can go to hell for it.”
How Ace managed to maneuver them around the piles of clothes and assorted to the bathroom, while still kissing Romana fervently, and with only minimal mishap, Romana wasn’t sure, but she was quite grateful for the skill. By the time they got there, Ace’s leather jacket and Romana’s frock coat had both joined the other assorted clothing on the floor, and Ace had more than halfway unbuttoned Romana’s shirt. Ace pushed her up against the wall and slid her knee between the older woman’s legs, while Romana arched shamelessly against her thigh and twined her fingers in Ace’s hair, tugging out its ragged braid. The laughter started when Ace, eyes bright with mischief, pushed her shirt down her shoulders just far enough to pin both her arms at the elbow, then bent to lick down her neck and onto the rise of her breasts. After that, neither of them stopped laughing - giggling, even, and Romana couldn’t remember the last time she’d done that - until they didn’t have breath for it anymore, and were far too distracted to worry about whatever little awkwardness had remained between them.
They did eventually remember to turn on the water, but there was very little actual bathing involved. They were too busy exploring every inch of each other, teasing out every detail that differed between them and reveling in the surprise of similarity and disparity both.
When the doorbell rang, Ace exploded with laughter again.
“Just leave it!” she shouted through the door, while Romana giggled helplessly in the shower-stall. It was all so absurd... she just couldn’t seem to stop, and didn’t particularly care - it had been so long since she’d been with someone as entirely alive as Ace, and it felt so good to drink that in, after years of wandering alone. When Ace finally stepped out, wrapped in a towel that just barely fulfilled the requirements of Human modesty, and stuffed a handful of bills in the delivery-boy’s face, Romana ended up laughing so hard at the boy’s saucer-eyed expression that she had to flop down on the sofa, even though she was still dripping wet. Once the door was shut, Ace joined her there, and it was quite a while before they could stop laughing long enough to eat.
“D’you suppose this is destiny or something? You and I meeting up like we did, I mean,” Ace clarified later, as they shared a bowl of eggplant curry.
“There’s no such thing as destiny,” Romana rebuked her gently.
“Oh, come on. You’re a Time Lord. You’ve got to believe in destiny - isn’t that what you all are supposed to be protecting? The way the universe is ‘supposed’ to go - that’s just another word for destiny.”
“No.” Romana poked around in the bowl with her chopsticks, neatly fished out a bamboo shoot and popped it into her mouth. “Time Lords defend the stream of time - we aren’t supposed to control where it’s going.”
“Tell that to the Professor...”
“Unless someone or something is already interfering with it,” Romana finished pointedly. “Then we’re allowed to intervene, to restore the status quo, or to... push things in a direction that allows more freedom for that species to develop as it naturally would. I may disagree with the Doctor on a lot of subjects, but I don’t disagree, for the most part, with te way he interferes with other species. Stopping the Daleks from destroying some planet, or keeping one species from completely subjugating another... that’s completely different from what I’m talking about. No, that’s not destiny. Destiny is just a fancy name for blind chance.”
“Sure, I suppose. Makes it sound so boring, though.” Ace leaned on her elbow with a thoughtful expression. “Like nothing matters, like it’s all just... meaningless.”
“Destiny’s what’s boring - acting like there’s only one possible way the universe can go, predetermined from the first instant of time. There’s nothing boring about blind chance.” Romana dug out another bamboo shoot and held it out for Ace, who nipped it off the chopsticks with a mischeivous wink.
“Sure...”
“There isn’t, though,” Romana insisted. Ace might not welcome a lecture, but it felt important to her at that moment to be properly understood by this Human. “The universe is built on chance. Everything - the stars, the solar systems, every living cell and ever complex molecule. All of it comes out of chance, in the end. An endless stream of order building itself out of chaos, and chaos arising out of order. All of it down to pure quantum chance, happening at the universal level. We’re not pieces in a puzzle that can only fit together one way, Ace. We’re tumbling atoms - quarks, even - zipping every which way through space-time... and sometimes we collide.”
“Like us.” Ace grinned brilliantly.
“Like us,” Romana agreed. “You never know what will come out of a collision like that.”
“Something good.” It wasn’t a question. Ace didn’t question things like that, Romana thought. She caused things - she was a catalyst, a bringer of fire and spark. Collisions and explosions and one path veering off sharply into another.
“This time? Yes, I’d definitely have to say it’s something good.”
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-10-14 04:22 pm (UTC)Does it have a title? My brain seems to think it's called 'Collisions', but there's no actual title at the top, so my head's just being strange. Edit: But of course I clicked through from the masterlist comments, so I missed the cut text :o) Never mind me.
Anyway, love it, bookmarking it, thank you thank you thank you! :oD *hugs*
no subject
Date: 2008-10-14 08:58 pm (UTC)I'd meant to title it "Collision Course" (but, um, I'm kind of stupid about posting things first thing in the morning and forgot to really mark that clearly), but honestly "Collisions" is a better title anyway. I may have to slip in and change it. ;)
*Hugs* I'm just happy you enjoyed it! It was a really fun prompt to write!
no subject
Date: 2008-10-14 09:05 pm (UTC)Oh good! I'm glad it was fun to write :o) I always dither over thinking up prompts, so I always feel like I've been really predictable - but I went through some DW quotes this time, to find the prompt quote (one of Peri's lines) and that made it a bit more thought-provoking, I imagine :o)
no subject
Date: 2008-10-14 10:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-14 05:02 pm (UTC)Thank you again!!!
no subject
Date: 2008-10-14 05:10 pm (UTC)Thanks so much for organizing all of this, and being so patient!