Warning: Contains slash (finally)

Pairing: Ford/Arthur

Words: 778

Disclaimer: I am still not Douglas Adams.

Thank you TheRimmerConnection for your faithful beta-ing, and Frizz the Eccentric for your faithful reviews. I salute you by holding a kazoo up to a whistling teapot to see what happens. (Or I will, if I ever find a kazoo.)

This is the part where I really will have to stop posting like clockwork... which is sad, but I don't feel all that guilty because, ultimately, I have Things up my sleeve.

Reviews are still many things, among them laudanum, chocolate, and unexplained penguins.


Zen & the Art

Of Distractions


Arthur was recovering well from the sudden shock of Ford falling abruptly out of the cubicle. In fact, the subsequent discovery of someone he had never met before but almost recognized anyway standing right outside the cubicle door had provided him with an acceptable distraction to take his mind off the distressing lack of the Earth or a place in the universe.

"So," he asked, managing even to muster some enthusiasm, "you mentioned food? I suppose dinner's been served by now. I've certainly been in here long enough."

"It has," Ford confirmed. "That's part of why I came to find you."

"Ah."

Arthur looked up and down the corridor of cubicles. He could no longer recall which way he'd come from. He didn't know which way Ford had come from either, though of course he hadn't been expecting him and therefore hadn't been paying attention, and the I think in the directions Ford had given a moment ago left him with some doubt as to whether he had either.

"I wish I hadn't sent the attendant away. I haven't the slightest idea where the exit is anymore, and that's probably the only task that thing is useful for… How did you find me in here, anyway? This place is like a…" He trailed off as he realized that Ford was staring at him with a peculiar expression. "Ford?"

If Ford had been human, he would have blinked several times at the interruption of his train of thought. As it was, he was not human, so he neither blinked nor felt any terrible need for his train of thought to be interrupted at all. "Hmm?"

"Why are you looking at me like that?"

Ford grinned. It was not particularly reassuring.

"Like what, Arthur?"

"Like… Well, like…" Arthur frowned perplexedly, finding that words escaped him. Or at least, he couldn't quite bring himself to blurt out his first thought, which was something along the lines of, Like I'm that Dish of the Day creature and you haven't eaten anything but pine needles and small red berries for months.

"If it bothers you I'd stop," Ford said reasonably. "But how can I, if I can't tell what it is I'm doing that's bothering you?"

Arthur blinked. "Oh. I hadn't thought about it that way." He had a nagging feeling that they were going off on some sort of tangent, but wasn't sure if there was anything he could do about it.

Ford's grin widened and he took a step closer to him. "Is that any better?"

"What?"

"Any worse?"

"Well, it's all about the same, but I don't see what—"

Ford took another step closer. "How about that?"

Arthur took a quick step in the opposite direction, backing into the cubicle. "Now look, Ford… What are you playing at?"

"Playing?" Another step. "Who's playing?" And another.

The last word was practically breathed against Arthur's lips, and then there weren't any more steps to take. He tried, but ran out of room and ended up sitting back down (a little more suddenly than was strictly comfortable) on the toilet lid. Then Ford was straddling his hips and doing some very interesting thing with his tongue that didn't seem content to stop at confounding Arthur's grasp on the English language and his ability to protest, but completely robbed him of breath as well.

"That," Ford said after a moment, "was testing. For a new theory of mine – what do you think, any good?"

"Guh," Arthur managed to reply, which was more of a noncommittal grunt than anything, meant to hold the place of some sort of coherent reaction that was bound to catch up with him eventually.

Ford took it as leave to kiss him again, and did so with increasing enthusiasm. There had been, he was deciding, more to saving Arthur from the destruction of Earth than just liking having him around. He was almost disappointed when he felt Arthur's hands creep up to his shoulders, as if to tug him away, but moaned triumphantly as he felt one hand slide tentatively up to the soft curls at the base of his skull and gently pull him closer. Arthur shivered at the sound, and began to kiss back.

This is quite a tangent, Arthur thought to himself dazedly.

They did not notice the shrill double shouts of, "There they are!" and "See, I told you!" from outside the cubicle, nor did they pause to acknowledge a strategic series of squeak-whistles that sounded like a teapot trying to communicate with an orca whale through a kazoo.

But they were forced to pay some attention when something very large crashed through the wall.