Summary: She's on a bed that's far too soft for her liking but the unmistakable hum of a TARDIS tells her exactly where she is and so what if she's already contemplating how to override the ship's controls and create a little havoc? A girl needs a hobby, after all.
Rating: T
A/N: AKA 5 times Missy tries to kill River Song out of jealousy and 1 time she saves her life for the same reason. I think I may have accidentally turned Missy into a stroppy teenager instead of an evil villainess. Oops. No one was around to stop me, OK. Story title from Hey Mickey because really, was there any other option?
You take me by the heart when you take me by the hand
1}
He's looming over her when she wakes, all stern eyebrows and sexy glaring. She hums and feels a smirk curling her lips. "Is it my birthday now?"
She tries to stretch, mentally cataloguing her surroundings – she's on a bed that's far too soft for her liking but the unmistakable hum of a TARDIS tells her exactly where she is and so what if she's already contemplating how to override the ship's controls and create a little havoc? A girl needs a hobby, after all – but when she tries to raise her arms above her head, she finds it impossible. She yanks her wrist experimentally and tilts her head with a frown, studying the handcuff holding her to the bed.
Raising an eyebrow, she turns back to the Doctor and purrs, "Miss me, old friend?"
His eyebrows knit together deliciously. ""Just a precaution. Until we're sure the TARDIS is capable of holding you without the restraints."
"We?" She rolls her eyes. "My giddy aunt, are you still hanging out with that wide-eyed pet? Didn't I give her a cyber boytoy to play with?"
His jaw clenches.
She pouts. "Not still angry about that, are you? I was trying to be nice."
"You're not getting anywhere near Clara again."
"Clara, Clara, Clara. Can't we talk about something else?" She tugs at her wrist, clanking the metal of her handcuff against the bedpost until it sounds like a familiar drumbeat. "You haven't even greeted me properly." She puckers her lips and watches with amusement as he recoils. "What's the matter, honey? Don't you -"
The door on the other side of the room creaks open and a woman – a stunning creature with wild blonde curls and curves Missy would literally kill for, she notices with annoyance – sashays into the room balancing a tray with a plate of biscuits, a scone with jam on the side, a cup of tea and a little pile of sugars. Missy sneers, eyeing her old friend's newest companion with undisguised ire.
The woman beams at the sight of her. "Morning sleepyhead."
Missy intensifies her glower.
The woman settles the tray on the bed, beside Missy's free hand and dusts her hands off, holding out one for her to shake. Her golden curls bounce around her head with sickening brilliance. "I've been dying to meet you. The Doctor never talks about his childhood and I'm convinced he's hiding all sorts of embarrassing stories from me." The woman winks. "We'll talk soon, just us girls."
Missy lifts her burning gaze from the woman's hand to sweetly demand the Doctor remove his pet from her sight before she strangles her with one bare hand only to freeze in place the moment she glances at him. He isn't looking back at her. He isn't even glaring any more. Instead, he's watching the irritant with soft, adoring eyes. His mouth, usually always turned down in perpetual annoyance, is even curved into a little grin like he simply cannot help himself.
"Oh absolutely, dear," Missy sing-songs, lowering her gaze to the tray in front of her. Next to the scone plate is a butter knife for slathering jam over them. Her fingers twitch. "Why don't you start?"
The woman tilts her head quizzically.
"Say something nice."
The knife flies from her hand and toward the little pet's face with delightful accuracy. At such close range, it should embed itself in her forehead and kill her instantly.
Should.
The woman smirks. Missy blinks, squinting.
"You were right, sweetie. She did underestimate me." The woman holds up the knife she had caught in mid-air, twirling it between her fingers.
Missy whirls to frown at the Doctor, silently demanding an explanation.
He lounges back in his chair at her bedside with a grin. "Old friend," he mocks. "Meet my wife. River Song."
2}
The Song trollop becomes a permanent fixture of the TARDIS. She comes and goes as she wishes. Sometimes she knows more than she should and sometimes she knows less than she had on her last visit but she never ceases to be absolutely infuriating.
Missy prefers the rare days when she does not appear, when she has the TARDIS and the Doctor to herself. Not that the Doctor is stimulating company. He never takes her anywhere. They stay in every day for weeks on end like an old couple who have nothing to say to each other any more. He never finds it funny when she unleashes the monkeys from the ship's petting zoo or feeds his goldfish until they explode. He barely even responds when she sits behind him in the library and flicks the back of his ear with her fingertip.
He's hopelessly dull in his old age but even he is preferable to days when River Song struts in like she owns the bloody place. Missy always tries to make herself scarce lest the woman actually try to speak to her again. Weapons are scarce on the TARDIS and she so hates to get her hands dirty.
She isn't allowed outside even with a chaperone so she occupies her time with exploring the ship's endless rooms whenever River is on board. The TARDIS is just as maddening as ever, never letting her into the rooms that hold any promise like the Doctor's bedroom (she refuses to think of it as the trollop's too) and instead showing her rooms filled with candy floss and an entire library of self help books.
It's just such an afternoon of exploration – she has been trying to find the wardrobe to change out of these godawful clothes the Doctor had given her and into something a wee bit more sophisticated – when Missy discovers the swimming pool. She almost walks right past it but the splash of water and the sound of the Song trollop's low laughter draws her attention to it.
"Sweetie, stop it."
Missy cringes at the giggled protest and mimics it in a girlish voice under her breath as she creeps toward the door. The simpering lovebirds hadn't bothered to shut it all the way and she peers through the crack out of sheer lack of anything else to do. The Song trollop lounges beside the pool in a red halter bathing suit, one arm dangling in the water and that smug smirk on her lips. The Doctor hovers over her and latches his mouth onto her neck like a leech. Missy hopes he sucks her dry.
River giggles again, her hand leaving the water to thread her fingers through the Doctor's gray hair. Her back arches and she sighs, her giggles turning into quiet moans as the Doctor trails his mouth down her throat and across her chest. "I've missed you, dear."
Missy purses her lips, glaring. He missed her? They see each other bloody constantly and he missed her? Rassilon forbid he tell his childhood friend he missed her after centuries and a time lock apart! Oh no. It's always you can't cook the monkeys, Missy and stop trying to climb into my bed, Missy and do you even have a conscience left, Missy?
But the Song trollop gets I missed you!
Straightening her shoulders, Missy fluffs her hair and marches into the room.
They're too preoccupied with each other to notice her approaching and her head is already filled with visions of dragging the Song trollop into the pool and holding her head beneath the water until she stops struggling, the Doctor watching in horror as his love dies. He'll get over her in time. Missy will make sure of it.
She hovers over them now, stooping to reach out a hand. She'll grasp the woman's disgusting bouncy curls in one fist and yank. Her body will hit the water with such a delicious splash – a slim but deceptively strong hand wraps around her wrist in a biting grip, drawing Missy from her fantasies.
Frowning, she yanks.
The Doctor releases her and she stumbles back on her heels, her hair slipping into her eyes. He doesn't even lift his head from nuzzling his wife's neck as he growls, "Get lost, Mickey."
She bares her teeth and hisses. "Missy."
The Song trollop's laughter follows her as she stalks back down the corridor.
3}
It's the middle of the night – or at least what passes for it in a time machine – when she hears raised voices coming from the Doctor's bedroom. Normally, she might gag with disgust and turn up her gramophone to drown out the sounds of animal shagging but this time, it doesn't sound as if they're enjoying themselves.
"We never go out any more! We sit here night after night like glorified babysitters! What's the point of escaping one prison to sit in another?"
They're having a row.
More importantly, they're having a row about her.
Oh, how utterly delicious.
Missy shuts her journal – the TARDIS had given it to her as another effort in self help and she likes to doodle ugly caricatures of her jailors and practice writing River Song is a dirty trollop in different fonts. She tosses the book onto her bed and tiptoes from her room down the hall to the one the Doctor shares with his unfortunate-haired mate.
"You know she can't be trusted outside with people! I can barely leave her alone on the TARDIS for five minutes without her flooding the console room or trying to put arsenic in the candy floss!"
Missy hums as she strolls along the corridor, edging closer to their room. That had been her most productive day yet.
"So leave her here," River snaps. "The TARDIS will keep her out of trouble."
She presses a hand over her hearts, affecting a pout no one else can see. Poor little trollop, going stir crazy cooped up with mad Missy. She puts a little flounce in her step and grins.
"River -"
"I swear to God if you don't take me somewhere in this bloody TARDIS and let me shoot something, I am going to actually succeed in killing you this time, sweetie."
Missy pauses at the threshold of their room, intrigued by this new piece of information. Perhaps the Song trollop has merit after all.
Ha.
Oblivious to her scrutiny, River and the Doctor keep shouting. The Doctor stands at one end of the room, his hair rumpled and standing on end, and River stands at the other end, looking at him like she can't decide if she'd rather kiss him or kill him. Missy knows the feeling.
But speaking of killing…
The trollop had left her gun belt complete with sonic blaster lying right inside the door, perfectly within reach of Missy's foot. Another infuriating part of the woman's presence is her vast array of weaponry and how completely blasé the Doctor is about it. Before River, he never would have allowed anyone to use guns in his presence, much less given anyone permission to bring them onto his ship. Missy hates the Song trollop even more for preventing her from feeling any glee about his corruption. River Song had corrupted the Doctor and if anyone had the right to do that, it should have been Missy.
She nudges the gun belt toward her with her foot and stoops the moment it's within reach, swiftly scooping the gun from its hold. It feels wonderfully heavy in her grasp and she smiles, hefting it up and aiming it through the doorway. The trollop hasn't moved and Missy wastes no time pulling the trigger.
It should have reduced her to a stain in the plush carpet. It would have – if River hadn't ducked and rolled before the shot could incinerate her where she stood. The shot hits the wall, leaving a smoking hole where River should have been. The Doctor turns to gawp at her in outrage.
Missy titters, pressing her fingers over her mouth. "Oops."
On the floor at the Doctor's feet, River grunts. "Well, that's one way to settle an argument." She shoves her hair out of her face and tips her head back to smile at her husband. "Frankly, my love, I prefer the angry sex."
The Doctor snaps at her to stay put and stalks across the room. Missy simpers in the doorway, blowing imaginary smoke from the blaster. He snatches it from her and waves it in her face. His eyebrows have gone all scary and he doesn't look nearly as besotted as he does when he's yelling at River. "Go to your room!"
Missy opens her mouth to retort that she may be a sociopath but she is not a child thank you but he slams the door in her face.
"What did I tell you about making sure your weapons are set on stun?"
"Oh please, sweetie! She's an evil mastermind. I think she can figure out how the settings work!"
Well, at least someone realizes she's a capable villain.
"That doesn't mean you should make it easy for her!"
Missy kicks the door in retaliation and stomps back down the corridor to her room.
4}
"Candlelit dinner. How precious."
The Song trollop had gotten her way, of course. While Missy was left alone in the TARDIS, locked away like an unruly child, the darling couple had gotten dressed up and gone out. A married couple going on a date. It's absolutely sickening.
Honestly, she doesn't even know why she's watching.
Feet up on the console and crossed at the ankles, Missy sinks further into her seat and glares at the monitor. She has never been above spying, especially not when it comes to the Doctor. She only wishes he would do something entertaining for once. Right now, he seems perfectly content to gaze moonily across the table at his stupidly lovely wife.
"Ugh, are they holding hands beneath the table?" She asks aloud, though the TARDIS doesn't deign to reply. Just as well. She hasn't sunk low enough to talk to the cow yet anyway. She tosses a handful of popcorn at the screen and makes a face. "You're a Time Lord, for Gallifrey's sake. Have some dignity."
On the screen, the Song trollop throws her head back and laughs at something he says. Missy can't recall the Doctor ever being funny. At least not on purpose. She sneers at the screen, watching River kiss her husband's knuckles and beam like he's the sun of her bloody universe. Disgusting.
She throws another handful of popcorn at the screen and mimics the undoubtedly irritating pitch of the trollop's voice. "Oh Doctor, you're so dashing and handsome. I'm not sure which is bigger, your manhood or my atrocious hair." She flutters her lashes and affects a girlish giggle before dropping the whole act with a scowl.
This is appalling.
How can she sit here and watch them have a nice peaceful evening together when they'd left her behind? They'd left her. River had promised to bring her leftovers and the Doctor had waved mockingly and told her not to wait up, the bastard. She is evil. She is not to be trifled with.
They must pay.
Without taking her eyes off the screen, Missy stands and reaches for the phone on the console. Tucking it between her ear and her shoulder, she hums to herself as she dials. "Hello, darling. It's Missy. That favor you owe me? I'm collecting."
The assassin arrives while they're in the middle of dessert and attacks the Song trollop with all the subtly of an elephant in a room of mice but it's of no consequence to Missy so long as the woman dies painfully. The Doctor is to be left alive, of course. Missy has plans for him.
The darling little restaurant erupts into beautiful chaos. River and the assassin throw each other around the room, knocking over tables and shattering glass. The Doctor stumbles after them waving his arms and pointing his sonic like it might help. Finally, some lively entertainment!
Humming, Missy watches with glee and waits for the killing blow to be delivered.
Except it doesn't happen.
What happens instead is the Song trollop wins.
She disarms the assassin, tossing his weapon to the Doctor, and presses him into the floor. She pins him in place with one knee to his neck and the other somewhere decidedly more tender. Missy watches in dismay as the pathetic excuse for a killer actually begs for mercy. The moment River shows him pity – which is pathetic in itself – he scrambles away from her on his hands and knees. He reaches the door of the destroyed restaurant, stumbles to his feet and starts running. He doesn't even have the bollocks to look back.
Missy crosses her arms over her chest and fumes. "It's so hard to find a good assassin these days." She sighs. "Well, if you want something done, do it yourself, I suppose."
The TARDIS responds this time with a faint hum but Missy is fairly sure it's insulting so she doesn't try to translate. Instead, she keeps her focus on the monitor, where the Doctor helps River to her feet, cradling her face in his hands and stroking his fingers tenderly over the bruise forming on her cheek.
Missy rolls her eyes. "Poor little wife. Kiss her all better, Doctor dear?"
River smiles and shakes away his concerns with a toss of her curls. And then bitch turns and winks directly at the TARDIS – winks – like she bloody well knows Missy is watching.
Howling in fury, Missy tosses the whole bowl of popcorn at the monitor and doesn't stay to watch the nauseating couple snog in the middle of the wreckage.
5}
"Busy?"
Missy glances up from scribbling in her journal to find the Song trollop standing with uncharacteristic hesitance in the doorway of the library. Shutting the journal just in case the woman might get close enough to see her newest doodle of River with warts and fangs, Missy folds her hands primly in her lap and affects a bright smile. "Yes. Planning your inevitable end."
"You and half the galaxy." River raises her brows and smirks. "Think this one will stick?"
"Yes, right in your heart."
River sighs. "Are you ever going to stop being such a stroppy child?"
For some reason, being around this woman made Missy want to act exactly like a child. She has the most overwhelming urge to stick out her tongue. "When you release me from my prison."
"Are you ever going to stop killing whenever it strikes your fancy?"
"If it ever stops being fun." She tilts her head, smiling. "Perhaps after I've finally rid the universe of you."
River huffs and pushes away from the door, walking slowly toward the settee Missy had long since claimed as her own. "Oh, stop acting so special. You're hardly the only psychopathic Time Lady living on this TARDIS."
Missy wings a skeptical eyebrow at her, curling her lip when the woman perches on the arm of the settee. "You? The Doctor's wee precious darling?"
"Reformed psychopath," she amends, shrugging her shoulders. "I did a stint in Stormcage for murdering him."
Missy affects disinterest and purses her lips against the questions she wants to ask, turning away. "I have no wish to hear your sob story, trollop."
River snorts. "I know. Just like I don't care how deranged you think you are."
She risks a peek at her and finds River watching her. She isn't smiling now. She watches Missy with steel in her gaze and for a moment, Missy sees not the woman in love with her childhood friend but instead the trained killer beneath. If she were anyone else, she might have been frightened by the glimpse. As it is, she's almost impressed.
"The only reason you are alive right now is because for some reason I'll never understand, the Doctor still cares about you. If that ever changes, I'll be the first to shoot, Mistress. And I don't miss. Ever." She smiles, baring her teeth. "Are we clear?"
"Oh, crystal." Missy smiles sweetly and leans in, beckoning River closer. "And I don't care if the Doctor loves you or not. I'm going to kill you good and proper." She smiles gleefully and whispers, "But that's just between us girls."
Instead of looking suitably terrified, River only smirks. "One day, we're going to have that chat. You'll see." She hops from her perch and tosses something onto her lap before she goes. "You can't be trusted with the hallucinogenic kind but we girls have to look out for each other, hmm?"
Missy glowers after her retreating form and waits until her footsteps have faded away before she dares glance at her little gift. Cautiously, she picks up the small, slender tube and peers at it. Lipstick. The Song trollop had given her lipstick. She upends the tube and reads the label. Mad Hatter Red.
Missy makes a face and tucks the lipstick into her cleavage.
She wears it that night as she sneaks into the room the Doctor and River share, knife in hand. What? Like a little peace offering was going to make her stop trying to eradicate the woman? Missy is not going soft, not even for a gorgeous shade of red lipstick she has missed dearly since the Doctor dragged her into this hellish prison. The Song trollop being nice to her just won't do.
Peering through the darkness, Missy tries to make out the shapes huddled in bed together in front of her. Bare-chested, the Doctor faces away from her, one arm slung over his wife's waist as he snores lightly into her bosom. River is in a similar state of dishabille, her hair even wilder than usual. Missy wrinkles her nose and does her best to ignore the hint of sex in the air. How plebian.
Well, the blood will cover up the smell soon enough.
She approaches the bed with the knife already raised, picturing the glorious spilling of warm red over her fingers as the Song trollop breathes her last gurgling breath, all wide-eyed and gasping like a landed fish. Missy might almost miss her if she weren't such an annoying bint. She smothers a giggle and aims for the throat.
River catches her wrist in a firm grip, her eyes still shut.
Missy sighs, drooping.
"And after I gave you a gift." She speaks softly, probably so the Doctor won't wake, and opens one eye to peer in amusement up at Missy. "What atrocious manners."
Pursing newly red lips, Missy glares.
"Now, what do we say?"
Missy stares. Surely she doesn't mean –
She tries to pull her wrist free.
River raises an eyebrow, tightening her grip. "Go on, dear. Say something nice."
Oh, the Song trollop will die. Soon.
"Thank you…for the lipstick," she says stiffly. The words nearly choke her on their way out. She adds trollop under her breath to make herself feel better.
"My pleasure," River purrs.
And then she has the nerve to release Missy's wrist and close her eyes again, like she doesn't fear for her life with a madwoman looming over her brandishing a knife. Missy almost slits her throat just for the slight. But no. That would be too easy.
Whirling on her heel, knife clenched in her fist, she heads for the door again. And if she steals a pair of Louboutins on her way out, no one is awake to prove it.
1}
"Space Florida?" Missy throws herself with dramatic flair onto the settee. "Why don't you just slit my wrists and let me bleed out. It'll be a wee bit more entertaining."
The Doctor rolls his eyes at her dramatics. "You keep nattering on about being bored, I'm letting you out." He smiles thinly. "You're welcome."
"This was the Song trollop's idea, wasn't it?"
"Stop calling her that."
"She hates me, you know. She came at me with a knife the other night – almost killed me. I'm not even kidding."
"I'm sure you deserved it."
Missy sniffs.
Space Florida is for happy families and newlyweds. It is not meant for Time Lady villainesses who would rather be running through the galaxy leaving a trail of blood and broken bodies in her wake. It is, however, outside of the TARDIS and Missy is getting desperate for space from the overbearing cow.
She puts on her lipstick and agrees to go.
They don't even bother with the handcuffs. Pity.
Missy follows the Doctor out of the TARDIS, River leading up the rear. The Song trollop had allowed the Doctor to pilot them to their destination so it comes as no surprise when they find themselves standing in the middle of somewhere that certainly isn't Space Florida. Instead, they're surrounded by Sontarans who all have their weapons trained on River.
"At last we meet again, Gigantic Head." One of them aims a gun right in River's face but before Missy can be happy about it, another has the gall to level a weapon at her. She purses her lips in disapproval, tutting. "This time, you will not escape."
"Wonderful," the Doctor grumbles, glancing at his wife. "What did you do this time?"
"She impugned our honor!"
He sighs. "Hen night? Again?"
River shrugs, offering him a bright grin. "Oops."
Nearly trembling with excitement, Missy steps out from between her jailors and daintily shoos away the weapons trained on them. "Now, now, calm down." She settles her hands on her hips. "Believe me, boys, no one understands your need to see River Song bleed like I do."
The Doctor snarls at her.
Missy shivers and winks at him. "Unfortunately, there's one teensy ickle problem."
The Sontarans exchange puzzled glances. Out of the corner of her eye, she notices River and the Doctor do much the same. "What's that?"
"If anyone gets the honor of killing the Song trollop, it'll be me. Now," she smiles, dancing between her unfortunate companions again and leaning her head on the Doctor's shoulder. "Say something nice."
It's but the work of a moment to pilfer the screwdriver from the Doctor's jacket pocket and rig it to serve her nefarious purposes. Honestly, as though a few bulbous headed, incompetent fools could just stroll in and steal the glory of murdering River Song right out from under her nose. Missy has worked too hard and for too long to relinquish her victory to anyone else, least of all Sontarans.
She surveys her work with a little smile. Sontarans kneel on the ground and howl, weapons destroyed and their hands reduced to mangled, bloody stumps. The sound of them vowing vengeance is like music to her ears. She hums along, closing her eyes. "This is much more fun than Space Florida, honey."
The Doctor doesn't answer.
Probably too busy cuddling his darling little pet.
She glances at him just to be sure and realizes he is indeed holding his wife close to his side but they're both staring at her, wide-eyed. While the Doctor's expression is utterly blank, River smiles at her, much to Missy's dismay.
"What? Stop that."
The trollop's smile only widens. "You saved me."
Missy gives a disdainful sniff and tosses the sonic back at them. "Only to kill you myself later. We're hardly going to start braiding each other's hair and talking about boys."
River glances at her husband with a wink.
Stupid ape. Half ape.
Missy simply can't stomach the idea of calling her a fellow Time Lady. She's more like a half-breed designer dog.
If the Doctor and his mate actually think she's gone soft or that they have somehow saved her from her own mania with a therapy journal and a tube of lipstick, they are sorely mistaken. She is simply possessive of her nemeses. The Song trollop's death is imminent and messy but it will be at Missy's hand. Nothing else will do.
Yes, it might have made more sense to let someone else do the work for her and yes it would have left her utterly blameless in the Doctor's eyes but, well…
Bananas.
"I'm feeling dreadfully altruistic now." She fluffs her hair. "Shall we go kill Hitler?"
"Been there."
"Done that."
Missy eyes her grinning wardens with renewed interest.
"What?" River smirks. "Like you thought of it first?"
Insinuating herself between River and the Doctor, Missy takes her arm and pats it wonderingly. "You know, trollop, perhaps we should have that little chat now."
It's the least she can do before she really and properly kills her.
Because she will. Just as soon as she finishes embarrassing the Doctor.
"Did he ever tell you about his puppet shows?"
"Don't you dare -"
River looks delighted. "Puppet shows?"
"Oh my giddy aunt, dear. He loved them. Such a little performer, he was. I still have pictures – here, look."
The Doctor groans.