Set some time in Series 10 - earlier rather than later. Fictional context. Totally AU. Some of this may be seen as being somewhat out of character, but I'm not so sure...just a weak excuse for some smut, really.

oOo

"Get out of there, Harry," Dimitri's voice shouted into his ear through the earpiece, "it's a multi-trigger device. We've only hastened the detonation."

"How long?" Harry asked.

"Two minutes if you're lucky. The bomb's in the west wing, so head east. You haven't much chance of getting out of the building itself, but if you can make it to the kitchens, they're in a single-story block on the eastern perimeter of the embassy. The destruction there should be minimal."

"Except we'll die of gas poisoning," Harry said, almost to himself.

"They've turned off all gas mains at the street. Harry, just grab Ruth's hand and run."

So he did.

"Where are we going?" Ruth panted, running next to him, wishing she'd worn flat shoes instead of boots with heels.

"To the kitchens."

"They're this way," she said, slowing and veering to her left, her hand still held tightly in his own.

"Are you sure?"

"I studied the layout. I always do before going inside one of these places."

"OK, but we'll have to hurry. We haven't long." Ruth heard the fear in his voice. If Harry Pearce was afraid, then there was good reason to be afraid.

They ran left, down the corridor, then right, down another corridor, through the double doors to the kitchens. Harry felt the rumble under his feet even before the sound of the explosion reached them.

"Under here – now!" he said, diving under a food preparation bench, taking Ruth with him, unaware of having lost his earpiece as he dived. The bench was around two and a half metres long and a metre and a half wide, and it was steel-framed. It would either protect them from falling masonry, or it would crush the life out of them as it collapsed on top of them. His life had been punctuated by risks such as this, but this time he was taking Ruth with him. He contemplated the unfairness of life, in that while he'd loved her for so many years without ever having made love to her, here today, in this building, they may very well die together, wrapped in one another's arms. This may be the ultimate intimacy. He drew her closer to him, and after some shuffling around, managed to lay across her, shielding her body should it come to that.

Then, all around them was Armageddon.

The sound was almost deafening, a long, slow roar, like all the Gods that be were angry. Harry covered Ruth's ears with his hands, and pushed his own head down between his arms so that his face was buried against her neck. His first priority was to protect her, but neither did he want his own hearing to be damaged. As though the laws of physics had changed in an instant, so that all action was in slow motion, the building began collapsing around them, and the air choked with fine dust. The floor beneath them shuddered and shook as though the earth had rolled and twisted, furious with the folly of humankind. Wooden beams splintered and snapped like twigs, steel beams fell with an ear-splitting crash, masonry exploded and disintegrated, steel appliances tumbled, cutlery clattered, and amid all this he was sure he heard the screams of those still trapped inside the main building. Harry closed his eyes and waited.

And waited.

When he opened his eyes, he found the kitchen to be almost in darkness. A fine beam of light shone through a hole in the roof, and thence through a gap in the masonry which was piled against the table, effectively trapping them in their place of safety. Twisted through the masonry were two steel girders, neither of which had landed on their refuge.

"Ruth?" He rolled off her body, and turned to her. She began coughing. The air was still thick with dust.

"I'm OK.. How in the hell are we going to get out of here, Harry?"

She sounded close to tears, so he put his arm around her and pulled her close. They could just make out one another's features in the darkness. Her face was very close to his, and he could see in her eyes the shimmer of unshed tears. He was breathing heavily from the adrenalin rush, firstly from getting here, then from having survived the explosion. His heart still beat loudly in his ears. He wiggled his toes, flexed his calf muscles, his buttocks, and then his arms. He was intact.

"Test your body for damage, Ruth. You have to know your limitations if you have any."

"I already have," she answered. "Everything is as it should be."

"What are the chances of that, do you think?" He smiled at her.

"But how will we get out, Harry?"

"We'll have to wait. If we try to move this rubble, we could make everything worse. I have no idea what it's like outside this tiny space." The faint sounds of sirens and shouting were coming to them from out there somewhere, but none of the activity seemed to be nearby. "It's possible we'll be in here like this for hours."

.

"Are you there, Harry? Can you hear me?" Tariq had been trying to raise Harry for over 15 minutes now. Since the bomb had detonated, Tariq had had no contact with him. The signs were very bad indeed. "Dimitri – are you there?"

"Sure, mate. I'm outside on the street. The place looks like a bomb site."

"Ha ha, not funny. Look, I've lost Harry. He's not answering."

"Yeah, me too. It doesn't look good. Keep trying, mate. Maybe he's lying unconscious somewhere. We have to keep our hopes up."

"I always thought Harry was indestructible," Tariq mused.

.

While his team were discussing him, Harry was lying under a steel table, his arms around Ruth, contemplating the irony of the situation. In order to get Ruth alone, and in his arms, they had had to firstly survive a bombing, and then find themselves trapped alone, unable to get out. He smiled into the darkness, and pulled her closer. She couldn't run away from him this time. He lifted one hand and with his index finger brushed away a tear which had been about to roll down her cheek. He then very gently kissed the spot on her cheek, taking his time to enjoy the feel of the softness of her skin. Ruth suddenly burst into tears. Harry leaned his cheek against hers, and began a slight rocking motion as he would were he quietening a distressed child.

In the few minutes she took to quieten, he felt himself becoming aroused. This was awkward, but not altogether surprising. They had each denied themselves the other for so many years, that he had reached a point where any direct contact at all with her brought about instant arousal. He really wanted her, and he wanted her now, right here, on a tiled floor under a table in a bombed out building. Of course, that would be impossible. Ruth would hardly be up for that, and she'd already commented on his poor timing. He could hear muffled sounds of large machinery outside the building. It would not be long before rescue workers began looking for survivors. Silently he hoped they'd concentrate on the main building, and leave the kitchen area until last.

"Harry, just move back a little," Ruth said, pulling her arms out of his embrace.

"Sorry, am I squashing you?"

"No, I quite like it. I just need some room for... this," she added, as she brought her hand up between them, and placed it gently on his chest. She slowly ran her hand over his chest, her fingers feeling his bumps and scars and his nipples through the material of his shirt. He watched her every move, stifling the groans that threatened to emerge from his throat. For the past five years at least he had lain in bed every night, imagining this scenario – without the bombing, of course – and he'd tortured himself over and again, imagining her hands on his body, just as they were now.

Ruth's fingers slipped through the opening between his shirt buttons to his skin beneath. This was when he groaned her name aloud. He felt her other hand slide down between them until it rested on his trousers, just over his very firm, very hot arousal. Slowly she stroked him through the material of his trousers. He was sure he heard her murmur the words, I want to feel you inside me. In all of his many fantasies, she was saying these words to him. With the greatest of self-denial and self-control, he grasped her exploring hand and pulled it away.

"Ruth," he gasped, "as much as I am loving every minute of this, we – can't -"

"Oh, I think we can," she said. He could hear the teasing in her voice.

Harry pulled away slightly, and looked at her. "Ruth, I always imagined our first time to be slow and beautiful and...and measured. Not like this. We're lying on the floor under a table surrounded by rubble, for fuck's sake."

"Harry, I just want there to be a first time. I no longer care that it's not perfect, or romantic. We have to do this, and I think we should do this now."

"But -"

"No buts. We can save the romance for our second time."

She'd said they'd have a second time. Ruth had said there would be a second time. But for there to be a second time, there had to be a first time.

Ruth began undoing his shirt buttons, and then she removed his tie. Very quickly she covered his bare chest with light kisses, while her hand dipped towards the waistband of his trousers. He lifted her face to his and kissed her deeply. Feeling her lips part beneath his, he pushed his tongue into her mouth, and found hers, before he slid his tongue in and out of her mouth, a practise run for what was about to happen elsewhere. He was not careful or polite; they did not have the time for being careful and polite. They had to get on with this first time for them to ever be able to indulge in the luxury of their second time. When they pulled apart, they were both panting heavily. Harry slipped one hand under Ruth's skirt, where he edged his fingers under the leg of her knickers. She was wet and slippery and oh so ready for him. He was hard and already throbbing, aching to be inside her, and almost beyond his own point of no return. What more was there to know? Ruth was right. This moment was a gift to them, and they should take advantage of it while they could.

Once he'd made the decision, everything happened quite suddenly. They pulled apart. Ruth quickly and deftly removed her boots and her skirt. Harry took off his coat and undid his belt and his trousers, sliding them and his underwear down until they were bunched around his ankles. They had become accustomed to the semi-light, and were grateful for it. He reached for Ruth at the same time she reached for him. He felt her hand circle his navel, and then she glided her fingers down his abdomen until she reached his penis, running her fingers along the length of it. At the same time, his fingers were inside her knickers, dipping in and out of her, while his thumb gently massaged her clitoris. There was no time for the niceties – the sweet-talking, the ear-nibbling, the languid hand-touching and eye contact - as much as they both would have enjoyed them. In this situation, as it stood, time – or the lack of it - was everything, and they had little of it in which to indulge their fantasies. Besides, they were both breathing heavily and loudly, rendering them incapable of sweet-talk.

"Now, Harry," she said. "It has to be now."

He quickly pulled off her knickers, ripping them in the process. As much as he wanted to taste her breasts, take her nipples in his mouth and roll them around with his tongue, kiss her stomach, and tease her clitoris with his tongue, neither of them would last that long. Ruth took his erection in both her hands and guided him towards her wetness. He groaned as he felt himself slide into her. She felt oh-so-good! He pushed himself as deeply into her as he could without causing discomfort, and then began the dance – the dance of lovers everywhere. She slipped one leg over his hips, and both her hands on his shoulders. He look down at her face as he pushed himself into her again and again. He was not gentle, and she seemed to expect that, even to enjoy it. Her eyes were closed and she was smiling. Again and again he thrust into her. It was only when he began to listen to himself that he realised that with every deepening stroke, he was saying her name. "Ruth. Ruth. Ruth. Ruth."

She came loudly, calling out – no, shouting out his name. "Oh, Harry, Harry – damn you," was what she said.

He only lasted another three or four strokes before he let go completely, spilling his seed inside her. "God. Ruth." was all he said before he quieted.

They lay together facing one another, under a steel food preparation bench in the kitchen of the Russian embassy in London, while all around them chaos and confusion prevailed. They lay each with their arms around the other. His trousers and underpants were still around his ankles, his tie and jacket somewhere on the floor behind his head, his shirt was open all the way down the front. Ruth was naked only from the waist down. If the others on the Grid could only see them now! It took some time for their breathing to return to normal.

"Why did you say that when you came?" Harry asked, his mouth close to her ear, his lips tickling her ear lobe.

"What did I say?"

"You said, Harry, damn you. What did that mean?"

"I said that?" He nodded. "I would have thought the meaning was obvious. Damn you for being so close to me, where I can't deny you or walk away from you. Damn you for desiring me. Damn you for being so sexy and so...er... fuckable."

"Fuckable? Is that even a word?"

"Probably not," she said with a smile, "but it should be."

He pulled her close and kissed her slowly, teasing her lips with his tongue. He was still hungry for her, and he still hadn't seen or touched her breasts. He suddenly had a strong urge to explore her breasts. They tangled their legs together so that his already partly aroused penis was again so close to her warm folds to be almost touching. He gently pushed his penis against her, hoping she'd open to him once more. He wanted so much to be inside her again that he could feel tears forming at the back of his throat.

"Harry, not again," she said against his mouth. "That's against the rules. Our second time has to be – you know – wonderful."

"And this wasn't?"

"It was in its own way, certainly, but -"

"It was a bit rushed, wasn't it?"

She nodded her reply. "But it was beautiful in its own way," she added. "Next time, we -"

"There will be a next time, Ruth. I promise you that."

Suddenly they heard voices coming from somewhere quite close. "Is anybody in there?" called a deep male voice with an east end accent.

Ruth and Harry looked at one another almost guiltily, and smiled.

"Are you ready?" he asked.

"Not really," she replied. "But we can't stay here forever, can we?"

"In here," Harry shouted. "There are two of us in here."

"Hold tight there, mate," a deep male voice answered. "We'll have you out of there in no time."

"Jesus, Ruth, our clothes," Harry said. "We'd better put them on."

"I suppose so. I'll never wear those knickers again."

"I'd quite like it if you never wore knickers ever again."

"And if I did that, how would we ever get any work done?"

"They say sexual tension is a fine motivator," he replied.

"A fine motivator for what?"

"That's a good point, Ruth."

"You'll have to keep calling out to me," the deep male voice said. "I need to know where you are."

"OK," Harry called, just before he leaned across to kiss Ruth one more time, a kiss full of promises and longing.

They each quickly gathered their clothes and pulled them back on, a difficult task, given the confined space under the bench. Harry tucked his tie into his jacket pocket.

"I suppose I shouldn't leave these here," Ruth said, holding up her torn knickers, "but I have nowhere to carry them."

"Here, I'll take them," Harry said, tucking them into his jacket pocket along with his tie.

Ruth smiled at him, a question in her eyes.

"What?" he said "We can't leave them here. That'll give too much away."

"What will you do with them?"

He shrugged his shoulders, a small smile turning up his lips at the edges. His eyes still on Ruth, he called out to the rescuers, "We're under the table. In the middle of the room."

OOO

This is a stand-alone story, but will be continued in a separate story, "There Must Be A Second Time", rather than there being extra chapters to this one.