"You stay here; I'm going in to get a closer look."
"River, there's at least a dozen left; you can't take them on alone."
"Come along, then. Or are you saying I can't handle some kids with snowballs and slingshots?"
There was no good answer to this question. If he disapproved, she'd tussle him up like a turkey and turn traitor, breaking their 20-0 winning streak. If he approved, she'd pack the kids into snowbanks like kippers. (It had been a very long game, starting with the holographic projector someone had nicked from the TARDIS.) "Can't we negotiate?"
"Not this time." River glanced at her wristband computer . "It's here, I'm sure of it."
"Well, then." The Doctor smiled. "Time for an old trick." He stood up, brushed the snow from his purple coat. "Anybody care for some marshmallows?"
Snowballs whizzed through the air, some breaking apart midflight, some diving to the ground. One smashed into the Doctor's left check. "Oye, that's not nice!"
His plea was answered with another half-dozen snowballs.
"River!"
No one answered. Two kids stepped out from the trees, more snowballs in hand.
"Now, really? I said I had marshmallows, I'd be willing to share. Or jammy dodgers, I'm sure I have some left in the TARDIS."
Two snowballs swooped over the Doctor's head, like spring birds chasing each other. Somehow they changed direction and zoomed towards the kids, who shrieked and ran back to the woods. The Doctor grinned. That's his River.
In front of him, the Doctor heard giggles and teasing shrieks, soon cut off by the thud of snowballs. Off to the side, perhaps forty-five degrees or so, he noticed something odd. It was just a starberry bush, but the marble-sized fruit is glowing white, not pale blue. The branches aren't as full as they should be either. It's an impression of a starberry, not a real—a hologram. "River, I found the holopro." The word tickled his tongue. Holopro. Holopro. Cool word. He bent over to dismantle the starberry hologram.
A green globe floated at the edge of his vision. "Something wrong with you? What'd those kids do? I'll fix it, don't you worry…" He looked up properly.
The holopro wasn't malfunctioning. He wasn't seeing thing. "Rutans." The jellyfish shape danged from a tree branch barely twenty feet away.
"We have been sent to contain the danger. We must ensure the question is never answered."
Rotten Rutans. "What's with the plural? Delusions of royalty, are we?"
"We are nothing. We must ensure the safety of all our people. This planet has been declared the greatest threat to our nation."
"Above the Sontarans? Did you hear that, River?" He raised his voice, but continued to fiddle with the holopro. "I am a greater threat to the Rutans then their archenemy. Quite an accomplishment, wouldn't you say?" He could hear footsteps in the distance, but the Rutan couldn't. Jellyfish weren't built for long-distance, non-aquatic communications.
"You must be destroyed."
There. He turned to look the Rutan in the eye. Or in the center of the floating blobby bits, anyway. "Think you might have a little competition. Those Sontarans fairly determined to do the job themselves."
Four Sontarans, blasters primed and aimed, approached through the trees.
The Rutan quivered slightly. "You are our mission." It twisted a few tentacles together, like a person wringing his hands. "But they are our mortal foes."
The moment the Rutan turned away, the Doctor bolted for the forest. It was darker under the trees, and he thought he could see figures moving. Not Rutans, though. Human, or at least humanoid. "River," he called quickly. "River."
She stepped out from behind a clump of cedars. "What is it?"
"Rutans. Used the holopro to create some Sontarans and distract them, but we have to get the kids back to Christmas. "
"Right. Party's over, kids. " She reached into her pocket and pulled the familiar squareness gun.