7. In which there is cardio and then there is flattery.
There's a lot of running with the Doctor, and can he ever run. It's like trying to keep up with a professional marathoner.
"It's like you've been doing this your whole lives," Alice comments one day.
He is infinitely amused when Alice starts doing cardio on the TARDIS; she even stops in for the odd aerobics class on some of their longer layovers. The ones that aren't fraught with peril, at least.
"I just don't see as how you need it," he says one day, perched on the metal railing next to the console. He watches as she completes her sets of crunches and moves on to jumping jacks.
"As flattering as that is (he grins), for one thing, I've decided I'm curvy enough for both of us. Not everyone can be as naturally model-thin as you."
He wisely refrains from commenting.
"For another thing, I have to be able to move better in all these crisis situations. I am not losing another pair of shoes to a wave of slime or lava or whatever alien is chasing us at the time simply because I can't outrun it. I don't fancy having to borrow your trainers again."
"To be fair, I don't know many people who could outrun a wave of lava," he says in what she's sure he thinks of as a consoling manner. He's quiet for a while as he watches her, then he apparently decides it's time to do something else. He's not very good at sitting still.
"By the way," he says as he hops off the railing, "I never did compliment you on that splendid bit of barefoot running you did over that sharpened, heated salt-gravel."
"It was that or be absorbed. Left me with some pretty exciting scars, too."
"True…doesn't make it any less impressive, though. Brilliant bit of running, that."
Author's Note: It never makes any sense to me that once someone becomes the Doctor's companion, they are automatically good at running. I know that the actors are in fairly good shape, but still…I've been in emergency situations, and even people who are in fairly good shape are not necessarily good at running. There's stamina and coordination involved. Some of us out here in the world are naturally klutzes and have to work very hard to overcome that. It made sense to me that some of the Doctor's companions would have to hone a few skills here and there, especially with someone so hyperactive and prone to spontaneous bursts of running.
