A/N:

Summary: The Gallifreyan Penguin ... A Documentary

Notes: It's my Birthday today! Yay me... So this means lots of interruptions and spending a lot of time on the phone and answering emails and FB posts ... not a lot of writing time at all...

So with that in mind: This comes as a specific request. Back a while ago, Aelwyn mentioned that the Gallifreyan documentary team who had accidentally wandered into Rose's private sanctuary needed to do a documentary on the CIA: The Gallifreyan Penguin. (inside joke)

I made a promise that I would write it for them as soon as we returned to Estrail. Well. We are back, and i am sticking to that promise. I've halted this right before the fight between siblings ... much of it is written, but it's not ready to post just yet. Got some tweaking to do on it before I'm happy.

I hope you enjoy this ... mild lighthearted stuff, really. Things from here start to get pretty dark, so enjoy it while we can.

~~oooOOOOooo~

"There are very few species across the entire universe that are as secretive and as dangerous to others as a Gallifreyan Penguin. Highly visible with their black and white colouring…"

"Why are you calling them penguins?" Lord Saron interrupted in question as he looked around his camera at the narrator. He looked beside him to another man holding a taped together boom microphone attached to a broomstick over the head of the young and fairly attractive Lord Ferrim. "Am I missing something? Can't recall ever hearing the CIA operatives referred to as penguins – never heard of the word."

Ferrim exhaled a hard sigh. "Is it really always so necessary for you to interrupt me mid-sentence to ask your ridiculous questions?"

"Hardly ridiculous," Saron said with a shrug. "Don't reckon I'll be the only one asking that question, and I don't think you've got an explanation inside that long-winded prose of yours, so you might want to consider that."

"Which is rather the purpose of a documentary, isn't it?" Lord Ferrim said with a grunt. "To analyse, explain, detail…"

"Tell me what a penguin is, Ferrim, I dare you." He pointed at the papers. "Don't look at that. You tell me, right now, just why you're calling the CIA unit penguins."

Ferrim lifted his chin. "Rose refers to Narvin and those wearing the uniform of the CIA as penguins, okay?"

"And what's a penguin?"

"A CIA operative, obviously," the boom guy answered with a shrug. "You not listening, Saron?"

"Not really. I'm not the one wearing the headset, Autern," he sniffed back with a gesture toward the headphones cupping the other man's ears. "So no. The less I have to listen to this idiot, the better." He settled the large camera on his shoulder. "Makes all this shit up as he goes along, I swear it. Not a bit of truth or actual research at all into any of it."

"Actually," Ferrim said with an indignant lift in his chin. He held up a thin stack of papers in his hand. "Researched and composed by his Lord Cardinal Braxiatel." He slapped the edge of the papers with the backs of his fingers. "And it's all good stuff. Verified and reviewed by her Lady Rose…" He frowned just slightly. "Although why she found it so amusing, I am not quite sure."

"Lord Braxiatel?" Saron queried with widened eyes. "He actually offered input for one of these things?"

"Insisted on it. Now please," he gestured to the camera. "Can we get on with it, please. I assured his Lord Cardinal that we would have this documentary completed before the end of this week."

"Yeah, right," Saron murmured as he settled his eyes onto the small display on the rear of the camera. "Go ahead, rolling."

Ferrim smiled at the camera. "The characteristics of a Gallifreyan penguin don't vary at all between each member. Male, or female, they all do tend to exhibit very similar mannerisms and behaviours – not to forget identical robing, which makes them very easily identifiable to the onlooker." He turned his back to the camera and in a very exaggerated manner, made a follow me gesture with his hand. His voice lowered in volume as he paused the forward march of the group with a lift of his hand. "Meet Narvin. The coordinator of the Celestial Intervention agency and lead penguin. In this one particular specimen we see each of the mannerisms and behaviours of a penguin on perfect display."

Narvin looked across the few metres of distance that lay between he and the small documentary crew with eyes narrowed in annoyed question. His back was held straight, and his chin was upward. There was a light darkening in his blue eyes, no doubt curious and annoyed as to what they were all up to.

"As you can see," Ferrim said in a voice that was little more than a low whisper. "His white robe and black tabard lends the CIA Coordinator a very visible and very proud posture. Despite his stature being somewhat less impressive than others, a penguin like Coordinator Narvin has developed a rather uncanny behaviour of being able to lift his chin high enough to be able to look down along his nose at any and all persons, regardless of their superior height over his own…"

There was a slight chuckle from Saron at that. "Brilliant," he breathed out.

"…This lends the Gallifreyan Penguin a level of arrogance that gives him the illusion of being higher than, and hold more superiority than he actually does…"

A female voice sounded up at that juncture. There was annoyance within the flatness of her tone. "Cardinal Braxiatel is responsible for this?"

Saron jumped in such surprise that the camera fell from his hold. With a yelp, a gasp, and the juggle of uncoordinated hands to try to stop the camera from crashing to the ground below him. "By the love of the Goddess. Wear a bell, won't you, Coordinator?"

"Why would I want to do that?" she questioned with clear annoyance.

"So you don't startle me into regeneration for one," Saron shot back as he finally managed to get control of the camera with an awkward forward lean.

"Oh, this is perfect," Ferrim gushed with a smile. "Perhaps you would like to participate in our documentary…"

"On the Gallifreyan Penguin?" Narvin droned flatly.

"Yes indeed," Ferrim answered with a proud smile.

She held out her hand. "May I ask for the study notes you're using for this documentary of yours?"

He straightened himself up and gladly handed over the notes. "By all means, Coordinator. You will understand that the notes were put together by his Lord Cardinal, and so any errors should be attributed to him and not my team."

She took a look down at the papers, and the neatly scrawled loops and circles of the language of the Time Lords typical with Braxiatel's penmanship. She read the first few circles of text and her eyes narrowed into slits of heated annoyance. "I'm going to take this," she grumbled with a lift of her eyes to Ferrim, her eyes almost black as they glared toward the narrator.

"It's the only copy I have," he answered worriedly. "I'd much rather that you didn't take them…"

She lifted her head then, her black eyes now filling with colour. "Then I tell you what. You let me take this for now, and I will return with an equally compelling script for a documentary on the Gallifreyan Cardinal." Her mouth tipped to one side. "And as I am the Coordinator of the CIA, and a specialist in gathering and collating all means of intelligence, you can be guaranteed of a rather exciting documentary for your viewers."

Ferrim thumbed at his nose. "Well. I don't know. Most Gallifreyans are very familiar with Cardinals. The Penguins, on the other hand – well, your kind are quite elusive."

"And also quite capable of hiding bodies where they can't be found," she returned flatly.

"Ahhh."

"There is a reason that my kind are as elusive as they are, Lord Ferrim. Do keep that in mind, will you?" She turned her head as the stalking and clearly furious Irving Braxiatel marched by them. "And speak of the Devil. Braxiatel," she called out sharply.

"Not now," he snarled in reply, not slowing his stalk at all. In his hand he held a sleek black device in a white-knuckled grip. For now it was silent, but mere moments ago he had it to his ear and was on the very butt end of Bernice Summerfield's endless amusement.

She caught up with him with a jog then slowed to a fast stride to keep up with him. "And what has you in such a foul mood?"

"Women," he growled under his breath.

"And on behalf of all of them I cheer in victory for whatever slight one of them has put upon you." She sniffed. "Although I doubt very much that your beloved mate would be so happy to hear you speak of 51% of all surviving Gallifreyans with such hostility in your tone."

Braxiatel stopped sharply without so much of a skid of his boots in the damp grass. He snapped a glare toward the female incarnation of one of his oldest friends. "Might I make a suggestion to you, Narvin? And this is one I very strongly recommend you actually seriously consider…"

"Coming from you, unlikely, but do go ahead."

"Never find yourself a mate." He curled a lip and resumed his brisk stalk. "More trouble than they're worth at times."

Narvin kept up with the pace. Her brows lifted high on her forehead. There was awe inside her tone. "Romana has done this to you? Well my level of respect toward her has just been significant elevated. Just what has our supreme Lady President done to manage to darken your mood so brilliantly."

"Not Romana," he corrected. "Rose."

Narvin made a slightly curious sound. "Rose isn't your mate," she drawled cautiously.

"I am aware of that. She's Thete's mate," he snarled. "Now where is that brother of mine, I need to have several words with him about the behaviour of his mate and her need to involve my wife in her madness."

"Out with the male wolf, if I recall correctly," she answered. "He inoculated and converted seventy infected Time Lords yesterday and was eager to get started early today to beat that number."

Braxiatel came to a stop once more. His eyes narrowed and he leaned down to look into Narvin's face. His voice was low. "Are you telling me that he woke, noticed that his wife was missing, and went out on a hunt anyway?"

"Rose is missing?" Narvin asked with her eyes flaring. She quickly turned her head, cupped her hands around her mouth and called to her younger self across the field. Once she was sure she had his attention and he was on route, she turned back to Braxiatel. "Narvin and I will pull some trusted CIA resources to try and locate her. I am to assume that she is with Romana right now?" she held up her hand. "No need to answer that, your mood is answer enough."

Narvin was at their side in far quicker time that was expected. There was a dark set of question inside his blue eyes. "What's going on?"

"Rose and Romana are missing," she answered him firmly. "We need to pull together who and what we can in order to locate them both. It doesn't need to be said that if any of the people here find out that the two female figureheads of this entire operation are in harm's way, then it will be chaos."

Narvin looked toward Braxiatel. His eyes raked up and down his stiff and furious posture. "How long ago did you notice them gone" he queried. His ability to be both emotionless and convey genuine concern at the same time was remarkable. "And do you have anything for us to go on in terms of being to locate them?"

"I know where they are," he replied darkly. He held up his phone. "At the Collection…"

Both Narvins went completely silent at that. Their countenances were a mirror of each other: flat, and very expressionless.

"At the Collection," Male Narvin said flatly. "As in your collection?"

"Likely with you as well," Female Narvin added with equal distain in her voice.

"And are you experiencing this rather intense level of fury because your wife might in someway be taking a page out of the Book of Braxiatel and heading back along your timeline…"

"Shut up," Braxiatel growled. He pointed a finger and let it swing between the both of them. "Not another word from either of you."

"Irrational hostility," Female Narvin muttered out of the side of her mouth toward her younger self.

"If your mate was expecting your child and had engaged in reckless behaviours like mine has done, then you'd be irrational as well." He lifted his hand to his mouth to growl through his fingers. "Rose is in my hearts, but by Omega, she is a bad influence."

The brows of both Narvins shot upward into their hairlines. It was the male that chose to respond to that, and he did so with a very awkward expression that may or may not have involved a quick look downward to Braxiatel's going before heading back up to his face. "Expecting. I see," he said slowly. "And by that I expect that this is a child that is incubated in a womb rather than a loom, which means…"

"Not something that needs to be thought about, nor mentioned … ever," female Narvin snapped out with a lift of her hand to her younger self. She leaned her head forward in a light bow and her voice softened with support. "Congratulations, Braxiatel."

The Doctor's voice came in with legitimate excitement. "Romana's pregnant?" he gasped out happily. Covered in dirt and dust and wearing an array of multi-coloured splatters of unmentionable substances, the Doctor smiled like a loon. "Well, congratulations, Brax. That's terrific news!"

Braxiatel spun to glare at his brother. "Yes, it is, isn't it? And I'd be very happy to take each and every one of your congratulations with a smile and an offer of cigars and whiskey, however right now I am much more concerned with the safety and the wellbeing of my wife and errant Sister in Law; both of whom seems quite intent on stressing me into a new regeneration."

The Doctor's face fell quickly. "What's this about Rose?"

"And Romana," Narvin offered up quietly with a look around Braxiatel's back to ensure that the Doctor seemed equally concerned about his own sister in law as he was his wife."

"And Romana, of course," the Doctor said with a quick nod of his head. "What have the two of them gotten themselves into?"

"A lot of trouble," Braxiatel snarled. "When I get my hands on them."

A gust of wind quickly swirled up around the encampment, bringing with it the howl and whine of a very young time ship's juvenile Relative Dimensional Stabiliser. It raked across the grassy landscape with a youthful and eager sound that was similar to laughter howling out of the vortex. Four pairs of Time Lord eyes shifted toward a spot beside Braxiatel's proud capsule, where a thin grey cylinder pulsed in and out of reality.

"Who is that?" the Doctor asked cautiously.

"It's not a capsule I recognise," Narvin said on a low voice. His hand automatically shifted toward his holster. "I know the registration numbers of all currently registered time ships, and that's not one of them."

"You know all of them by rote?" Braxiatel queried.

"There's so few left," he answered. "They deserve to be remembered."

Female Narvin's face stretched into a smile. "Oh, I know that one. Playful young buck, he is. Doesn't matter how many years he puts on his odometer, his materialisations always sound like a happy laugh across the Time Vortex." She held her hand against where her younger self held onto his staser. "They're safe," she assured him.

"Who?" he asked her quietly.

She flicked her eyes to Braxiatel. "I do believe your wife has returned."

His eyes were wide as she capsule finally hissed out his final materialisation with a cloud of steam. "Where did Romana find a capsule?"

"It's not Romana's capsule," she replied with a smile. "He belongs to Rose. This must be when she created their symbiotic link."

The Doctor gasped out. "I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"I'll add my incredulity to the Doctors'," the younger Narvin said with a twist in his expression. "A non Time Lord cannot create a symbiotic link with a capsule. They don't have the symbiotic nuclei required for connection…"

"Noooo," Narvin drawled slowly in reply. "They don't, do they…"

Braxiatel waved a hand at all of them. "We can argue the finer points of symbiotically linking with a travel capsule later. Right now I intend on having a few words with…" The doors to the capsule swung open in an excited manner. Romana stepped out of the ship first, followed in a line by Leela and then Rose. Braxiatel immediately stalked forward, his attention on the last person in the group. "Rose Tyler-Lungbarrow," he growled out hotly. "I want to have a word with you."