AN: Just a silly idea I couldn't get out of my head. A million thanks to Becs for the beta and the advice.
Set & Spoilers: During Day Of The Moon, references to DOTM and events around it. There are probably spoilers for all season six, actually. Nerds...
Disclaimer: I don't own. Sad face.
Enjoy! x
Mind Control
by Tricki
The only downside to diving into the TARDIS' pool from a great height is the fact that her dress gets all but ruined. She's grown to rather like it, too, she muses as she slips out of it and into a TARDIS blue silk robe. It forms a soggy green ring on the floor, which flashes green and black depending on exactly how she looks at it, and it's a shame. She bends and searches out its straps, hooking her fingers through them and holding the garment at shoulder height. A veritable torrent of water floods out of it. River winces and begins to gently wring it out over the pool, hoping it's salvageable.
Given that her parents are in the general vicinity, she has deigned to leave her soggy knickers on until she can lock herself in the closet and find something dry to wear. If it were just her and the Doctor alone in the TARDIS, regardless of where they are in their respective time-streams, she would've quite happily strolled through the blue box sans pants and robe. Oh well, there would be other times for that. Many, in fact.
Once she reaches the wardrobe she begins to shed the silk garment encasing her, but stops when she notices the black markings covering her arms, the tally of Silents. Yes, this is a wash-job, not just a quick change, she decides as she re-ties the robe. She flicks through a rack of clothes until she finds the items she wants, and proceeds to her room. Well, in a technical non-wibbly-wobbly sense, it's just one of the generic spare rooms – or it was, before she snuck into the main control room and programmed in her dream bedroom and en-suite. The en-suite has a clamshell bath. Yes, an actual clamshell bath. Enough said.
Once in her expansive and, let's face it, slightly melodramatic bedroom {there may or may not be some red velvet in it. On the antique Epoch round sofa. And the drapes. And the throw at the end of the bed} she lays her clothes out on the bed before she crosses to the chest of drawers, retrieves a set of underwear and deposits them on top of her khaki dress. Once her outfit is arranged, she sheds the now damp robe and knickers and makes her way to the heavily marbled bathroom.
Above her shell is a showerhead that pours torrents of water like a waterfall, and she is glad of a warm soaking rather than the frigid dip in the pool she's just had to endure. She scrubs the count of Silents from her arms with spicy smelling soap and quickly rinses the chlorine from her hair before reluctantly turning off the warm waterfall cascading over her and stepping out of the shell, winding a fluffy white towel around herself and returning to the bedroom.
As soon as she crosses the threshold between the bright bathroom and the romantically lit bedroom she knows something is out of place. A quick scan of the room tells her what's missing, but it's the absolute last thing she'd expected. She does a second scan, but she comes up with the same thing:
Her underwear is missing.
She frowns deeply and crosses to the bed, running her fingers over her dress. She's quite sure she laid a set of olive green lace pants and bra on the bed, but they are distinctly not here. She brushes wet hair from her face; it has been rather a long day, maybe she's imagining it.
No. Her underwear is - at worst - La Perla {and isn't that a ridiculous sentence?}, and at best handmade by the corsetieres of Algenon Quadera, a planet inhabited by giant silkworm aliens that weave lace to personal specifications as they work. In short, her knickers are unforgettable, and she distinctly remembers fingering through the collection, considering the police-box blue set, deciding to save it for a more amorous occasion, and settling on the olive green combo – which is distinctly not here at present.
She concedes the point and settles on the pewter ones with silver lace cobwebs across them as a second choice and proceeds to don her khaki dress with its asymmetrical hemline, slipping on some shoes before exiting and continuing to towel her hair dry.
In the console room she finds her parents and her lover, although none of these people know that they are these things to her. Her Doctor spares her a soft glance, and it matters a little less that they haven't done Jim the Fish yet. He still, in some way, in some part of himself, cares for her. She sees it in his eyes, even if he doesn't quite know it yet. When she sees the disgraced FBI agent Canton Delaware she is convinced that now is not the time to make wild accusations. She needs to wait until she and her lover are alone somewhere before bringing up the topic of her undergarments.
The opportunity presents itself shortly after they've deposited her mother and Canton at the orphanage and her father has disappeared to get changed, when she and the Doctor are left alone in the console room. He is fumbling ineffectually with the controls, trying to smooth out the flickering of the cloak mode. With her back to the console and without even glancing at the controls, she reaches across him and flicks the cloak lever – he hasn't clicked it into the lock position; it's bouncing out and breaking the circuit. She glides between him and the bar, ignoring his obvious discomfort, and smiles seductively at him.
"You know, you really didn't need to resort to acts of petty theft." Her words are provocative, but no more so than the look in her eye.
"Hey, she stole me as much as I stole her." He says defensively.
A throaty laugh bubbles from between her lips. "Not the TARDIS, darling."
A frown clouds his features, and her green eyes drink him in. She enjoys bemusing him. "...What exactly are we talking about, Doctor Song? Not that I don't enjoy your 'I'm going to eat you for breakfast' face."
"Can I drown you in maple syrup and whipped cream, first?" She purrs. Her smile is worryingly predatory.
"Only if I can dip you in yoghurt and coat you in chocolate buttons - now what are we talking about?" His words stay at one level, not breaking pace for the change of topic, while his eyes follow her as she circles him. They eye each other like lions about to attack.
"What's going on with my underwear." She answers his question after too long a pause and leaves him behind.
"What?"
"We're talking about my pants." She sees him begin to shut down, sees him cloud over and about to get all stuttery.
She passes close behind him and leans up to his ear. "You don't need to steal them. If you want my knickers, all you have to do is ask." Her smiling lips brush the curve of his ear
"It's a rare occurrence, I know, but I'm still confused." The Doctor states, twisting his head to follow the hand that has trailed from the tip of his left shoulder to the tip of the right, catching the peppery scent of her soap and resisting the urge to lick her wrist. He has no idea from where that urge arose.
Her fingers dance down his jacket-encased arm. "Don't be coy, sweetie, it doesn't suit you. While I was in the shower you snuck into my bedroom and took my underwear. I was only in the next room; you should've visited." Her voice lilts musically, teasingly. If she wasn't spouting such un-unravelable nonsense he'd find it quite endearing.
"Doctor Song, intriguing though I may find your pants, I can assure you I did not sneak – hang on, what do you mean your bedroom? And what shower just one room away from what bedroom?" He demands.
Her eyes narrow slightly. "You have no idea what I'm talking about, do you?"
"I do believe that's what I've been saying for the entire duration of this conversation, and that should really be telling you something because it's long been established that I... am exceedingly clever." He boasts.
"You're saying you know nothing of the handmade olive green lacy pants and the bra from Algenon Quadera, and further to that you had nothing to do with them disappearing from my bedroom while I was having a shower?" Her tone is blatantly interrogatory.
"I know nothing of said pants," he smiles wickedly, and now it's his turn to circle her and mumble oh-so-seductively in her ear "but now I highly wish I did. And I'm still waiting for an explanation of this bedroom and shower, so I think ignorance is my best defence."
She considers him carefully, silently analysing his features for truthfulness. "Then who took my knickers?"
"That, River, is a question I doubt I can answer." He says, turning his attention back to the console.
"Could it be Canton?" She queries – because, really, it can't be her father, even if he doesn't know he is yet. Right? Please let that be right. She prays.
"I think you're a bit too lumpy-bumpy, for Canton's taste." He says, eyes surveying her appealing curves.
Her eyebrows skyrocket. "Excuse me?" She demands. "Last time I checked you were quite fond of my various lumps and bumps."
"Oh, I'm quite fond of your parabolic formations," he says, abusing mathematics quite appallingly and making the curly haired woman laugh derisively at him. "I mean, he prefers the company of men, dear."
"Then who?" She presses him.
"Rory?" He suggests.
"Oh, please, no." She groans. The look of confusion on his face tells her she's said the wrong thing, and she quickly recovers. "Rory loves Amy. He wants nothing to do with my underwear."
"Amy, then?" His eyes glint with mischief.
"Amy also prefers the company of men."
"Yes, that's something I can attest to." He agrees, earning a dangerous look from the woman standing opposite him and not quite understanding why.
"So where does that leave us? My clothes are inexplicably dematerialising, is that it?"
"I don't know," confesses the Time Lord thoughtfully. "I may have a better idea if I can examine the scene of the crime."
River's lips quirk wickedly. "You just want to see my bedroom." She accuses him. His only concession is his left eyebrow rising and falling suggestively. "You only had to ask." She grins, and begins leading him towards her self-programmed quarters.
Once he enters, his eyes widen exponentially. "My, what big velvet you have." He mumbles, poking a lampshade and then fumbling to catch it before it topples from the table. Where most people would have coat-hooks, she has a series of wall-mounted leather holsters for her guns.
"Ah, I still have the power to ruin your command of the English language, I see." She teases, brushing her body against his maddeningly as she passes.
"Well, ah" he begins, scratching the back of his head awkwardly before deciding on a topic jump. "I don't remember programming this room."
"Hm, must be getting old." She dodges neatly. "So, my clothes were laid out here," she gestures to the end of the gold and cream striped bed. "Shall I show you?" She grins wickedly, reaching for the zipper on her taupe dress.
She nudges it down until she's showing rather a lot of cleavage and a sizeable portion of the pewter bra {he doesn't think about fingers being like spiders in silver web. At all} and he bounds across the room and zips her up again, babbling: "no that's really quite extremely very fine – wonderful imagination over here!" He keeps his eyes averted, and it entertains her immensely. It's not like she's got anything he hasn't seen before in his nine-hundred-and-some years.
"As you wish, my love." She smirks to herself evilly. "As I was saying, my clothes were laid out here; I went over to my lingerie drawer," here she makes a show of crossing to the chest of drawers, opening the drawer in question and flashing as much silk and lace as she can. "Selected an aesthetically pleasing yet practical set, laid them out on my dress, and proceeded to have a shower in the en-suite." She turns to him, one eyebrow arched pointedly, accusatorially.
"I have definitely never programmed an en-suite into this TARDIS."
"Except for your own, mister blue tiles." She challenges him.
"I don't have an en-suite. And this is the most times I've said 'en-suite' in an entire year. Well, except for that week I spent with Ann Boleyn. Odd taste in safe words – anyway, that's not the point, the point is: I don't have an en-suite and I certainly didn't give you one because I never even gave you this bedroom because, 'hello, Doctor Song, I hardly know you.'"
"And yet you feel the need to rescue me whenever I need rescuing." She says, deciding to file Ann Boleyn for future reference.
He begins to stammer; he doesn't know why he feels this pathological need to keep her safe, and why he so enjoys it when she falls into his life, as she has literally done today. Suddenly a thought occurs to him. "Anyway, why would you know whether or not I have an en-suite?" He frowns.
The look she gives him is something between fond and weary. "My love, I would say 'spoilers', but really I'm pretty sure even you can fathom the implications of me knowing the configuration of your bathroom."
"Even me!" He is affronted, and his bemusement makes her sparkle.
"Even you, sweetie."
"So where is this fabled en-suite?" He asks standoffishly. River gestures lazily towards the bathroom with an elegant little rotation of her wrist. He strides bouncily in the direction she's indicated.
"Talk about bigger on the inside, this is bloody enormous!" He exclaims, and River's lips curl. He is silhouetted in the doorway, but turns his head back over his shoulder to scrutinise her, hands still pressed against either side of the doorjamb. "Do you fancy yourself as Venus, Miss Song?" He queries lightly after considering her shell.
Her lips pull slowly into a smile, a cat-that-got-the-canary smile. "Darling, I am Venus. Sandy did such a good job. A little conservative with the breasts, but he's the master, who was I to argue?"
He turns fully and looks at her in shocked, impressed amazement.
"'Sandy' as in Sandro Botticelli?"
"What? You're not the only time traveller here." She says, and she actually has the audacity to wink.
"No. No, I'm beginning to gather that." He says slowly while he studies her. He wonders if he'll ever get to hear all her stories.
"So?"
"So, what, my dear?" The Doctor asks, teasing her with the term of endearment.
"So, where are you hiding my pants?" She purrs slowly, approaching him and making to dip her left hand into his right pocket. He catches her hand before she manages to wheedle her way inside his trousers, and leans against her ear to avoid the scoff on her face.
"River, listen to me very carefully: I did not steal your pants. Nor did I steal your bra. Nor have I ever in any way handled your undergarments." She pulls back from him, even though she's very much enjoying his breath on her ear, and says:
"Well, not yet perhaps."
"Are you spoiling me, Doctor Song?" He teases, and, perhaps not for the first time, but for the first time he'll admit to, he wants to kiss her. He really wants to kiss her.
"Trust me, sweetie, there are other things I'd much rather do than spoil you, right now. After you give me back my knickers. Or at least promise to tie me up with them."
"I promise," he smoulders, and she whimpers then groans with delight, but he proceeds to break her heart by finishing with: "that I did not take your pants."
"Then who did?" She demands, getting legitimately irritated now.
"I don't know! Perhaps there's a temporal underwear vortex in here."
"Yes, that sounds likely." River says dryly, rolling her eyes.
"Alright, let's conduct a little experiment, then." He says, ignoring her tone. "River, give me some knickers." He requests.
"Oh I was beginning to think you'd never ask! Give me a minute to get my boots off." She beams with delight and sinks onto the bed, reaching for a buckle.
He scoops her up by her shoulders and guides her in the direction of the dresser. "From the drawer, River." He mumbles close to her ear, smiling despite himself. While she once again makes a show of picking a set of underwear, he crosses to the corner and folds his arms over his chest, observing the scene.
She settles on an emerald green set, lays them on the bed, and turns to him. "That's what I did."
"That's all?"
"That's all. Sweetie, it's just knickers; I wasn't preparing for battle. Well, that was a bad example, but you know what I mean."
"I do. What did you do after?"
"I've told you this. I took off my robe," she gestures to the hanging blue garment, "and I went into the bathroom to have a shower." He nods towards the door, indicating her to retrace her steps. She does and he follows. Once she's in the doorway she spins, finds herself dangerously close to him, and says "See, they're still – oh my god." He spins on his heels to follow her gaze, and his eyes widen exponentially.
"What exactly are you doing with my pants?" Demands certified psychopath Doctor River Song sternly of the Silent holding them.
"River, would you please let me handle this?" He chides her, not taking his eyes off the alien before asking it: "what exactly are you doing with her pants?"
"I have no need of answering your questions." Wheezes the alien menacingly.
"Forgive me." River says politely, twirls a gun out of the holster at her side and aims it confidently past the man she loves and at the Silent. "Now!" She says with false brightness. "Tell me why you took my pants." The alien does not respond. "Don't make me do this." She sighs, sounding bored. "Five seconds." She cautions, to no response.
"Five.
Four.
Three.
Two.
One.
Footless!" She trills, shooting the Silent's right foot. It crumples to the ground and River circles it until her back is blocking the door. "Feeling talkative yet?" She queries. The Silent howls with pain.
"Why are you taking my underwear?"
"What you call 'underwear' is a weapon."
"A weapon?" The pair chimes in unified confusion. River almost shoots him a glance, but catches herself before she takes her eyes off the Silent.
"Dangerous River's underwear may be, I'll concede, but weaponisable? That I don't buy."
"Not sure 'weaponisable' is a word, sweetie." She shoots at him across the room. His eyes sparkle with affection and mischief for the woman who's invaded his TARDIS. "Now, how are my pants weapons? Who are you using them against?"
"'Against whom' – "
"Shut up, my love." She snaps at him lightly. "Now, you were about to say..."
"Against the Doctor. "
"Why is my underwear a weapon against the Doctor?" She frowns, all business now. Because, really, if her underwear can be used as a weapon against the Doctor, she really should be the one to know it. Oh the plans that must be made...
"Your undergarments are the only items which have power enough to control the Doctor."
River has the temerity to let all the wicked thoughts in her head flash across her face.
"How do River's pants control me? River doesn't control me so her pants certainly can't- I mean, pants are just fabric. River's pants can no more control me than one of Amy's flannel shirts. There is no difference whatsoever."
"The undergarments of the one you call 'River' control your mind by the means of distraction. You cannot help but consider the undergarments of the female in this room. Your mind betrays the desires of your body which you strive to deny."
"Oh, this is juicy. Tell me more tell me more." River gushes enthusiastically.
"Control yourself, Song." He rebukes.
"Sweetie, the issue here is my controlling you, not myself."
"River" is his firm warning, and even though she doesn't take him seriously, she holds her tongue. "How did you get into my TARDIS? My TARDIS has shields..." He comments, taking a few steps into the room.
"Your shields can be fooled!" Rasps the white faced alien with the disproportionately sized head.
"Are there more of you in here?" He asks carefully, and River can see that he's mentally calculating the logistics of an in-house alien extermination – something he's not extremely keen on.
"I have no need of telling you anything!" The Silent snarls, and without a second thought, River shoots his other foot, making him wail in anguish.
"No other of my species has been on board the Doctor's TARDIS." Confesses the creature, and River relaxes her hand, her finger now merely resting rather than poised against the trigger of her blaster.
"Good, well I think that pretty much wraps this up, then!" Begins the Doctor, but he's interrupted by his friendly neighbourhood psychopath.
"Not quite yet, sweetie," she silences him, not looking at him. "There's still the small matter of my pants."
"River, really, I just want you to stop and assess whether or not that's important in the greater scheme of things right now."
"Now I know you're young – an older you would fully appreciate the importance of my underwear. Especially my hand made ones."
"River..." He beseeches, sounding pained.
"Where are my pants, alien boy?" She demands, tightening her grasp on her blaster.
"I told you I didn't touch them!" He whines, and utterly by accident River's head spins at him as she barks:
"Not. YOU!"
Her head cocks and he sees her forget everything. "Why am I shouting at you?" She asks blankly, and wonders why he isn't meeting her gaze.
"River, I want you to look diagonally down to your right." He instructs her calmly. She obliges and lets out a little gasp when she sees the Silent.
"What's going –?"
"- He's been stealing your pants to use them as a weapon against me – honestly, keep up, Song!"
"Right. Where are my pants, alien boy?" She repeats, not realising she is repeating herself. The creature makes a hissing noise at her, and her eyes flash, conveying the danger of the situation to the alien.
She does a stock take of her usual shooting pattern; both the feet are out, she needs to move to the left hand. "Would you like to lose a hand, too? Because believe me, I've can go all day."
Silence from the Silent.
"Tick tock goes the clock." She trills, her voice singsong; the Doctor can't help wondering why that seems so familiar, and so significant. "Alright, pick a hand, any hand." She announces, changing tack and beginning to flick the gun from the Silent's left to right hand. She charges the blaster so it makes an impressive zooming sound, and the Silent holds its hands in surrender, before reaching into its inside pocket and removing a canister, which it flicks at the Doctor's feet.
"What is this, smell proof?" The Doctor queries, stooping to retrieve the canister.
"They're clean." She mumbles irritably. He pokes a finger into the aluminium-esq tube and wiggles it experimentally.
"Silk and lace. I think this is what you're after."
"You are allowed to look." She smirks, mentally rolling her eyes.
"Rather not, if it's all the same to you, what with there being a mind-altering alien in the room."
"As you wish, my love." She shrugs, flicks her blaster onto vaporise mode, and disposes of the Silent neatly.
As soon as the room is sans-Silent, River looks slowly to the Doctor, confused, and finds him with his hand in a metal canister the shape of a giant Panadol capsule.
He follows her gaze to his hands, yanks his finger from the capsule in shock and ends up covering himself in four pairs of River's handmade bra-and-pants-sets. He yelps with surprise, and tries not to look at the heliotrope knickers that he's somehow managed to fling onto his head and are half covering his left eye. The look of guilt on his face is incomparable. River smirks wickedly, doing a quick stock-take:
The heliotrope pants have come to rest on his head, while the bra is in the crook of his right elbow. Her largely see-through black Aztec patterned set is on his shoulder and over his right thumb respectively. The vermillion pants of which she's particularly fond are caught on one of his jacket buttons, while the matching bra is over his left shoe. The olive green set which she lost this morning is, most tellingly, in his hands.
"Oh, sweetie, now you've ruined your birthday surprise!" She mocks him. "I'll just have to think of something else for when that auspicious date rolls around." Her words are too accommodating, and it frightens him. From under heavy lidded eyes she looks up at him and says: "In the meantime, however..." and just as she's about to pounce on him he thrusts her olive pants and bra into her hands, shakes off the remainder of her undergarments and begins to bolt for the door, calling over his shoulder:
"Sorry, River, appointment with the president of the United States and such. Can't be helped! Rain-check, perhaps!"
"Excuses, excuses!" She calls after his retreating form. She may not remember the altercation with the Silent, but River Song has never really needed alien intervention to tell her what an effect her underwear has on a certain Doctor.