This is continued from the previous chapter, a 2 shot if you will.
Well, this certainly took me long enough to update, and I am sorry, no real excuses but a lack of inspiration (even though I love writing this story, I have just written the chapters after this one :P
Also, a little disclaimer. The timelines are a bit wibbly wobbly, with the first chapter. Molly does mention that she's already saved Sherlock when she first meets The Doctor, but that doesn't necessarily fit with the remaining times, Sherlock having met The Doctor in the process of being saved. So Molly did meet The Doctor under the same circumstances in this AU, just missing a line or two from the first chapter.
Enjoy...
"Hello there, John Watson." Donna's vibrant hair bounced as she locked the TARDIS doors and bounded up to meet her friends at the controls.
"Always a pleasure, Donna Noble." 'Three continents Watson' let an easy smile take over his features. Sherlock scoffed, but was more than happy to see John flirting with a woman who was far from boring.
"Donnnna!" The Doctor's tone was warning as he slipped a vile of the anti-plastic he had found when searching his timeworn leather jacket, something that suited the past him far better. Why couldn't she just leave the charming army Doctor alone? It was bad enough he had to suffer the secret smiles of the newly married Holmes'.
"I'm saying hello to my friend you skinny man child. No need to take that tone with me." There it was the fire, the umph that immediately had John flirting like there was no tomorrow with the redhead of his dreams. Well, with The Doctor, there may well be no tomorrow. Even if he did flush a pale shade of red.
"Oh, Doctor do leave them be." The Doctor conceded at Molly's words, he found he had no urge to ever fight with Molly.
Sherlock rounded the TARDIS console, the anti-plastic was limited and with this new subspecies, this new strain of Auton they would have to revise and recreate the formulae; without all the details at his disposal and The Doctor's unique last minute plans, Sherlock was thankful of the TARDIS and the rapport he had built with the magnificent machine over the time he and Molly had travelled with Donna and The Doctor; she was certainly more use than a microscope, she was a vast source if Alien knowledge and that she existed across all of time simultaneously this blue box always knew the solution. The screen beeped and flashed a new formulae created on the screen, some of the symbols were clearly Galifreyan, and although Sherlock had a basic knowledge of the written form he could not quite decipher the final few words. Pushing the screen, spinning it round the central column, it came to a halt when faced with The Doctor.
"I understand that the TARDIS can recreate the basic formulae, needing to add a calcium phosphate to counteract the acidity of the newly created beings, but that last sentence, what else do we need to add?" Sherlock scrunched his nose, something Molly had come to find an endearing sign of confusion.
"Ah!" The Doctor chuckled. "A spoonful of sugar will help the medicine go down. Mary Poppins knew her stuff!"
"Mary Poppins was real?!" John, Molly and Donna chorused. Sherlock was yet to understand the cultural reference.
"Very real, and a brilliant TimeLady at that. Also the reason Mycroft has a penchant for umbrellas if I am not mistaken." The Doctor was grinning broadly, swaying on the sides of his well-worn trainers.
The formulae needed 3 hours to expand and combine to form the correct proportions of the concoction, the TARDIS would handle all the fiddly stuff, and the monsters were at bay for now. He could catch up with old friends, he could hug Molly Holmes nee Hooper, and he could pick the mind of a genius and attempt to teach him about the stars. Three hours was a long time, in order, in the pace of a human life, so they talked and talked, they laughed at the varied attempts Molly had taken to invite The Doctor and Donna to her wedding day, including calling in on Torchwood, and yellow spray paint across the roofs of Baker Street, the words 'Doctor, Come to my wedding?' still emblazoned there and readily available on Google Earth. At one point in a lull of conversation, and with Sherlock and Molly no longer tangled hands and passing glances he stole Molly away, through the corridors and halls, into the room that was her second home.
The TARDIS library held that distinct book smell, a mix of old and new Molly twirled round looking to the ceiling only to find the towering bookshelves had at least doubled in height since she'd left them, empty though some of them maybe. "You've been collecting."
The Doctor looked proud of himself as he pushed down the shelves lowering the shelves, or lifting the floor, so that Molly's eyes could spot her own name on the spines of journals, textbooks, essay collections, and even a few non-fictions. "They're good. Brilliant, actually." His smile clear in his jubilant voice.
She looked a little more closely, avoiding the spoilers, like titles and dates, but something caught her eye. "I publish under Hooper then." It wasn't a question, but The Doctor still nodded.
He turned to her, lowering the floor or raising the shelves, she still couldn't decide, and grasped her face between his rough ageing hands. He couldn't hide his 900 years from her. Brushing away the hair that seemed to be permanently falling across her face, pulled free through a hard days work and the running The Doctor's presence entailed. The Doctor traced the timeworn lines of her face, etched there through laughter and happiness; some were even from her time with him, not as he had feared, formed from worry, heartache or torment.
"My gorgeous Molly… are you happy?" The words stuck in his throat a little as he pushed on through the sentiment. Never meaning to go beyond the realms of friendship, but they had always referred to each other in such ways, it had stuck.
"Of course I am, you old fool!" She laughed, easing his worry. As his arms fell back to his sides Molly grasped his face and planted a noisy kiss upon his cheek. "Now, c'mon, we have a world to save, you can't be checking up on me."
"I have to check up on you Hooper, it's my job. I don't want to leave it to wanton acts of vandalism and unfortunate place, fortunate time invasions again."
"We won't. And that's a Hooper promise."
"And a Hooper promise is a kept promise." He beat her to the all too familiar words.
"Are you happy, Doctor?" Molly questioned.
"Aren't I always."
"No." She cut in. His eyes lit up, emotion was certainly there, but reading this man was how she knew the depths of Sherlock Holmes. The false smile of a TimeLord, held distinct similarities with that of a Holmes.
"But now I am. With Donna, she still keeps me in my place. I've seen you again, and I even had the pleasure of fighting the 'bad dreams' set to cancel Martha and Mickey's wedding."
"Good, just checking. Although if we want to get on and save the world, remember practically perfect people never permit sentiment to muddle their thinking."
She paused, as they walked the always different corridors to return to the console room. "Are you sure Mary Poppins was a TimeLady, she sounds very much like a Holmes."
"What's that love?" Sherlock has caught the last glimpse of his name, his interest piqued as he whished to know where his wife had been whisked off to, contrary to popular belief he cared of Molly's whereabouts, constantly.
Molly had no time to answer as the TARDIS set about emitting dings and bings and a plethora of noises The Doctor had collected and loved throughout his time visiting earth. The anti-plastic was complete and it was time to defeat the Auton's attempts at invasion once and for all. Two vials popped up from the console, Sherlock and The Doctor swooped in and simultaneously caught and pocketed a vial each.
John and Donna sighed in exasperation; the smug grins that the two geniuses were mirroring from each other were almost sickening. Molly on the other hand giggled.
"Oh, if you two could see yourselves, you look like you're in a cheesy action film!"
Running, there was always so much running. John thought.
Bloody running, if I get all hot and sweaty in front of John I'm going to throttle The Doctor. Donna's mind tried to catch up with her body.
Running, gosh I didn't realise I was so unfit. Molly decided to leave her huffing and puffing to the back of her mind, almost dragged along by the loose grip of The Doctor and Sherlock's hands.
RUNNING. I've missed this. Was the two geniuses synchronized thought.
"The signal, Doctor! You mentioned a transmitted signal; from the last time you faced the living plastic. Where's the signal?" Donna blurted as they rushed blindly along the London streets, as was always The Doctor's plan. How Sherlock had missed that was beyond the congregation of heavily breathing people, Molly had her hands on her knees glaring at her 'handsome man' and her husband. "I've been running for twenty minutes… and neither of you had a BLOODY clue where we were going. I always got this from him," Molly pointed roughly in The Doctor's direction, "but Sherlock! You never solve something blindly."
The woman were seething, John held back his mild frustration and The Doctor smiled clumsily as Sherlock answered his wife affronted. "Well, um… I understand now it was an illogical assumption, but we haven't travelled with him for so long, I just expected the man who had defeated these alien's previously to have a full plan."
Unable to stay mad at anyone for any length of time, Molly hugged her 'Mr. Holmes' and entwined their fingers as she pulled away.
"Did you say a transmitter, a signal, like a giant satellite dish, what about the London Eye?" John suggested, his expression proud and ego puffed up with his chest.
"That was last time! They're not ones to repeat themselves… but ummm, good idea John." The Doctor ended as he gained a fierce look from Donna. John still deflated.
"The Shard! It's a reasonably new construction, if the living plastic has been here as long as you say, it could easily been incorporated in the construction, and WiFi these days, they'll be no need for a dish like for transmission." Molly squeezed his hand, the logic was infallible, and she could see the affection The Doctor was about to unload on the somehow always unsuspecting man.
"BRILLIANT!" The skinny man would have kissed the stoic man again, he would have lifted him up if he were stronger, yet instead he held the man's shoulders and slapped his cheeks in quick succession. Leaving behind a stunned Sherlock and the soft giggles of the remaining group.
They had run and run, skidded across winding repetitive corridors and stairwells, chased and hid, finally finding the, if anything, poorly hidden living plastic. There had been a scuffle where John had shot a plastic man and The Doctor had tutted profusely at his adamant gun use. The Doctor, of course, clumsy in nature, and thankful for the back up had dropped his vial of anti-plastic whilst in search of his 'clever glasses', only to find his void-stuff detecting colour-filled paper frames.
Thankfully Sherlock had swooped in his coat swishing glory, emptied the spare vile making sure every drop and small crystal of sugar emptied into molten mess that filled the basement floor.
The 'dream-team' had saved the day. And all but the two tall, while regularly to be found brooding, men looked much worse for wear.
Tea, the saviour of worlds, the quintessence of British culture, and the best way to end a day chasing monsters and fighting aliens, so that's just what they did. Retreating to the all too familiar, but somehow changed, rooms of 221b Baker Street (a woman's touch), and cooed over by the kindly woman from the flat below, even if she did tell The Doctor off several times for being so rakishly thin as she loaded his hands with biscuits and cakes alike, Donna had only laughed heartily amongst bouts of "I told you so, Martian!"
Donna and John had flirted with vigour and unresolved passion. Molly and Sherlock had gone against even their norms, filled with relief, and snuggled openly. The Doctor chatted about the old days and the new days with Mrs Hudson, and for 2 hours, in their 221b bubble, everything was solved and fought and safely hidden under the bed.