Title: Lesson Learnt
Author: tromana
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Zara/Zinc
Spoilers: The Prisoner's Dilemma and The Judgement of Isskar.
Summary: He taught her to be selfish. It's his fault.
Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who (or Big Finish). But I do write far, far too much fic.

Lesson Learnt

She placed a kiss delicately on his lips. Physical contact was a new experience for her and she was eager to learn, eager to please. Ever since she had suddenly popped into existence and felt that first dirty breath of air. It was part of her construction, her very nature to want, to need. She pulled away.

"You tease." Zinc stared at her bitterly. She was his woman with no name, his team-mate. His better offer. She wasn't meant to treat him like this.

"You taught me," she replied.

She smiled as she stroked a hand down his back and he groaned gently into it. She grinned as she snatched it away, dashed off, picking up the time ring and her satchel and gave the ring a solid twist and disappeared before his very eyes. He growled under his breath. She'd promised him the Universe, the most powerful artefact in the Universe and here he was, playing second fiddle, to a naïve and impressionable young woman. He'd only taken her under his wing because he thought he could fleece her out of everything she owned. It seemed the young learned quickly. Too quickly, for his liking.

He had no idea where she'd disappeared to, how she'd cope on her own. Who she'd more than likely latch onto on this jaunt of her's. Harmonious-14-Zinc had had to learn to be possessive. It was a natural progression, after all. Time and space travel was obviously very different from life on his home planet of the commune of the White Sun, where people had little more to strive for apart from the next scientific advancement. He genuinely hoped Magda would be alright on Eratoon. Still, it was nice to be rid of her and having her memories wiped was far simpler than a messy divorce. It felt like she dragged him down, sometimes, with talks of mundane things such as settling down properly, children. This construct by 'the grace', whoever they were, was exciting. New.

Zinc slept fitfully as the construct searched, becoming increasingly frustrated. Sneaking into the castle was as easy as it had ever been; the politics of this place never bothered her so the indigenous insect species never paid much attention to her. It wasn't just her nose that tickled here; her whole head did. It throbbed and ached. The segment should have been blindingly obvious to her; she knew that because that was how the grace had encoded her. She sighed heavily, because it felt right in such a situation and turned the time ring, returning to the place she'd left Zinc. She made sure it was a sufficient distance into the future, a couple of days or so. Enough time for him to become just a little bit concerned about her. So that he was as frustrated with her as she was with trying to find this segment.

As she popped back into existence, Zinc woke, startled. He stood up and glared at her, his sopping wet fringe plastered to his face. She smiled brightly at him and sat down beside him as the heavy rain continued to fall. It may have been a cliché, but this planet was similar to that of the one she was 'born' on. She felt safe here.

"Where did you go?" Zinc snapped. "S'not that I've been worried or anything…"

"I just went to stretch my legs," she replied.

"For two weeks?"

"Yes."

He snatched back the precious time ring and Zinc raised an eyebrow. She was becoming more like him than he expected. That meant he could only trust her as far as he could throw her. Little did he know that knowing her at all was the beginning of his downfall.

end