Disclaimer: All recognisable characters, concepts and situations belong to the BBC.
A/N: Written as part of the word of the day fiction challenge. The word was: sybarite. This follows directly on from Sojourn.
"So, this is fun, isn't it?"
It was cold and dark at the bottom of the hole. The Doctor had been surprisingly unsympathetic upon learning they were unhurt, had promised to come and get them as soon as he was free, but his voice had been rich with barely suppressed laughter.
Rose wasn't expecting him any time soon.
"Nothing like visiting a pleasure planet and ending up in a bloody great hole," she continued. Realising too late what she'd said – and more importantly to whom she'd said it – she twisted and slapped a hand over Jack's mouth. Her instincts had been right; judging by his grin whatever he'd been about to say was unutterably filthy.
Not unlike their current physical state.
An observer would have been forgiven for mistaking them for some new life form, waiting to be born from the mud of the earth. They were both coated in it and slime matted Rose's hair into a sticky mess plastered down her back. Huddled together in a rounded hollow in the side of the pit, the rain dripped onto their feet, filling their shoes where they projected from their meagre shelter.
She suddenly squeaked and pulled her hand away from Jack's face. He'd licked her palm, an action his sudden grimace indicated he was now regretting; all of Rose was coated in mud, including her hands. "Serves you right," she said primly. "You're the one that got us into this mess in the first place."
"Hey," he protested, "I'm not the one that got us stuck down here."
"Yeah, but we wouldn't have been running away from those…" her imagination failed her, and she hesitated before continuing, "…people if you hadn't tried to sell me."
"And if you'd just shut up and let me do the talking we could be lounging in a private bar, sipping drinks and having fun, instead of sitting down here in a puddle!"
"Excuse me? You could have been doin' all those things. Me, I would have been bunged up in some sort of bizarre outfit. I mean, did you see it? There wasn't even any material in it. It was all leather thongs and stuff. No way."
Jack sighed. "Rose, it would've been temporary, I wouldn't have left you there. It was only a trial after all; they just wanted to see how you'd present before we started bargaining."
Words failed her, they really did. She loved him but times like this she wanted to coat him in honey and stake him out for the ants. Or whatever they had on this planet that passed for ants. "Yeah, fine for you. You they wanted to get drunk so you'd sell me for less. No one was asking you to audition to be a…a…" she stuttered to a stop, unable to come up with a description she was prepared to use.
"Doxy? Courtesan? Moll? Floozy? Strumpet? Inamorata? Love slave? Concubine?"
"…concubine," she interrupted, cutting off the stream of words, some of which she'd never heard before. Trust Jack to know a half-dozen different words for prostitute.
"Hey, it's not such a bad life."
So casually uttered, but Rose stiffened in shock. Peering up at him through the gloom, she tried to tell if he was serious. You had to be careful with Jack. He could utter the most outrageous statements with perfect innocence, a dozen different versions of cheeky sincerity and none of them revealed a clue to what was underneath.
"You were a…concubine?" Her mind froze, trying to picture him in the wisps of leather she'd been presented with earlier that evening. "Really?"
He met her eyes and nodded. "Yup, thought I'd swap the excitement of being a Time Agent for the sybaritic lifestyle of a kept-man."
"Huh." She wasn't sure what to think.
She felt the slight tension in him at her response, confirmed by the hint of defensiveness creeping into his light-hearted tone as he asked, "Not a job you've ever considered?"
"It's not that, it's just, why'd you stop being an agent? Would've thought playing the dashing hero would be more your style."
Obviously she'd said the wrong thing. Tense muscles now felt like steel, pressed against her side.
"Well, things change."
She shook her head. "It's just odd, ya' know? Weird. I mean, I could see you going freelance or you know, conman," she grinned at that, "but concubine?"
"Does it matter why?" His voice was flat, emotionless, his body rigid beside her. Unbidden, a series of pictures flashed across her mind, vivid memories of him facing down those three creeps in the bar, of the look on his face when that blue bitch had grabbed him. She'd forgotten the hints she'd seen of a different Jack hiding under the ebullient playboy she knew.
Suspected it was that Jack sitting next to her now.
She wasn't afraid of him, didn't think she ever could be, but she was cautious, unsure what she should do. Not wanting to make it worse and definitely wanting to make it better. Even if he did start it, she thought; if he didn't want to talk about it, why'd he bring it up?
She sighed. "The Doctor should be here soon." When in doubt, change the subject.
"Yeah." Now there was a hint of emotion. Relief? Rose wondered about that, wondered what he thought of the Doctor; remembered comments about flexibility and dancing and decided she didn't care.
Sighing, she leaned into him. No response. He was solid beside her and she could feel the tension reverberating through him. Wanted to do something to bring back his good mood. He'd been happy, relatively, considering they were stuck at the bottom of a hole.
"Sorry," she offered. She felt rather than saw his startled response.
"What for?"
"Dunno," she replied mournfully.
"What?" He sounded totally confused.
"Well, I don't know, do I? But I know I said something wrong." Sighing exaggeratedly she continued, "you're just so sensitive." She waited, hoping he'd get it, that he wouldn't take her seriously.
He didn't. "You are so strange, you know that?" She could hear the smile in his voice, felt him relax slightly.
"Me? I'm not the one who wanted to me to be a concubine!"
"Well, you would have looked delicious in the outfit."
"Yeah, yeah." Sliding her arms around him, not sure why except that it just felt right, like it had felt right last time they'd waited for the Doctor, she hugged him, resting her chin on his shoulder.
Felt him lean his head against hers, disregarding the stickiness.
"Rose…"
"Yeah?"
"Sorry. I shouldn't have brought it up; it's not something I like to think about."
"Why'd you mention it then?"
"Thought it'd be a distraction. I should've known you'd ask 'why'; anyone else would've asked for a story."
"Hmmm, okay. Tell me a story."
With a breath of laughter he suddenly hugged her. "Well, my first day we ended up at this party, and I was wearing, well, let's just say there wouldn't have been anywhere to hide my sonic blaster…"
The two of them huddled together at the bottom of the muddy pit, waiting for the Doctor while Rose's giggles drifted out, audible even over the sound of the rain.
sybarite SIB-uh-ryt, noun:
A person devoted to luxury and pleasure.