A/N: I'm trying something rather beyond my usual scope of things, with a character whose entire character arc, I'm pretty sure, was some sort of fever dream. So by all means please feel free to comment good or bad on this and (hopefully) enjoy!
The ship was large, freezing, and uncomfortably empty. Out beyond its walls and shields lay the void, so hot it froze or so cold it burned, edged with background chatter and silence. Lonely and yet full of life.
River thought that a very good description of the Doctor, too. She couldn't stop thinking about him, to her own frustration and others. Yet she couldn't help but to feed her obsession, surrounded as she was now by stories and artifacts (all replicas, of course, she knew a fake when she saw one) dedicated to him. Questions and hopefully answers, too, lay just beyond the doors in front of her, painted up blue with familiar panels River hasn't seen in lifetimes. Instead of the police box instructions, though, some very boring bulletins had been posted on it. The windows were darkened and a sign, "Museum Director" had been glued onto the tinted glass.
A metallic, artificial cough distracted her from star gazing at said doors. She stood and promptly dropped her folder, arms numb from sitting in one position for too long. The contents drifted on currents of recycled air. River and the android watched them float to the ground. She took a controlled breath to calm herself.
"The director will see you now," the android intoned in its flat, radio-static voice. It wasn't even an android proper, not really, but some ugly swansong to the boxy tin man robot of yore. River had heard the director was a bit of an odd duck. It almost made her wonder if the Doctor himself resided behind those doors. He was, after all, the oddest of ducks.
She had just barely gotten her papers back in her folder when the robot pushed a button and the doors swung open on silent hinges. River straightened, fixed her wild curls of hair, and steadied herself before she took that first step.
When she'd lost her purpose in life - or rather, changed it of her own accord, as it was all about perspective - River had also lost that confidence, that dangerous flipancy, that had come with it. She would have liked to have kept the latter, but was happy the former had gone. So here she stood, ready to craft her own rudder and regain her bearings.
Darkness lurked around the edges of the office, hiding all its empty space, so it felt more compact than it was. Whorls of smoke hung in the air like abstract art, and in the quiet she heard glass chime on metal. Resolutely, River approached.
This was the foremost authority on the Doctor, tucked away in a dusty old museum in an empty corner of the universe, one in a long line of fools who dedicated their life to him. And River was about to join those ranks.
"Sit," a voice, female, commanded. River sat. Instead of a view out into space, the director had a wall of the Doctor she was starting at. The eyes of one man, many faces, in a hundred photographs and looping video clips, stared back.
"You're here to learn about the Doctor." It was a statement, not a question. "Have you visited the museum? Maybe bought my book? It's quite good, or so I've heard."
"O-of course!" River said, hoping to cut off any notion that she hasn't done her research. Because she had, for longer than this woman could even guess. River wasn't just the audience to the Doctor's life, she was a part of his history herself. She would make herself a part of his future, too. "But I need to know more."
The director was silent. Then: "Oh. The one with the dissertation. That's right." She spoke with a quiet singsong tone, as though to herself. She hasn't even remembered who she was meeting with!
Deep breath. Be calm. "Are you going to help me or just promote your book?"
The director sighed and a plume of ghostly curls rose. "I suppose soooo. For the good of the greater academic community, of course."
River had to bite her tongue before she snapped some remark she'd later regret at the dismissive tone. The director was being very apathetic about a lifetime's work. Work she still hasn't torn her gaze from, though River glared intently at the back of her chair.
"Of course," she echoed.
At that, the director deigned to turn around and set her glass down, more empty than full of glinting amber liquid, next to a more empty than full decanter. Up until now, River knew next to nothing about her. She had been a secretive person with a consuming obsession and the money to fund it. No photos, no real name on her publications, only signed the Director in some mockery of the Doctor. She wasn't what River had expected. Small, thin, with sharp cheeks and eyes and a pile of dark hair with a hat clipped to it. Red lips to go with red nails.
A cigar with a ring of lipstick hung between those red nails. Smoke curled from her nostrils like dragon's breath. River thought she was trying too hard to look either quirky or dangerous. The fake fruit on her hat made it difficult to gauge. The Doctor once wore a celery, but that had been a real vegetable. This definitely wasn't the Doctor.
The director held out her hand. "We should start with introductions."
River took it. She was willing to do anything for the Doctor, even stand this woman.
"River Song, archaeology student."
"Missy, the Doctor's biggest fan."
They shook.