Lose Me in You

Gerard was just drifting when he saw the blip. It was the smallest motion on the radar screen inside his ship, a tiny flicker of activity on the sensor. Anyone else would have disregarded it. It was a big universe and such a small signal could be anything, absolutely anything. But the sound of the monitor was one that he immediately recognised, and at first it was familiar but not clear. It took him a few moments to realise that he recognised the sound specifically, remembered it from when he did a scan on himself.

He ran to the screen and squinted at it. He tried not to get over-excited, he really did. Optimism might bring him crashing down, and he couldn't handle that. He repeated the scan and the blip was there, on the screen, its coordinates so far off that it was no more than a pixel in size. But the sound was still there, loud and clear and wonderful.

He kicked his TARDIS into full gear. He set his destination coordinates closer to the blip, but not all the way. Observe from a distance was his policy, and then dive when the situation dictated. Judge the leap.

This time, the sound was louder, as expected, the blip was bigger on the display and it had shape. It had a wonderful, undulating shape of interlocking ovals, and if Gerard didn't already have a favourite shape, he gained one at that moment.

He turned off the Chameleon Circuit and soared. He pumped the air with his fist, he pulled the acceleration lever and danced, whooping with joy. He was so happy he could cry. The TARDIS sped ahead with full force, flying at a speed it had never before been capable of. The innards of the control deck, the heart of the TARDIS, glowed ethereally, brighter and greener, more aquatic and euphoric. It couldn't help but share his abundant ecstasy.

She was waiting for him when he landed. She was standing outside her own ship, identical to his in so many ways, when he saw her. He didn't find her, they found each other. He had appeared as the same blip on her own radar screen and she had landed on the nearest pleasant and abandoned moon so that she and Gerard could have peace and silence.

Or rather, so that Gerard could mumble and stutter trying to think of the correct words for the situation. Hayley would have been just as bad if it had been her responsibility to say the first thing to the only other member of her species that she knew of. The only other Time Lord in existence, as far as she knew. This was it. It felt so good it could have easily been a hallucination or a very, very good dream.

Eventually, Gerard managed to form language. He didn't quite manage the correct form of language, but English also happened to be one of the billions of languages that Hayley knew. "Hello."

"Hello," she replied awkwardly. She was as dumbfounded as he was, torn between inviting him into her own TARDIS, asking him if he wanted to go for a stroll and discuss things, or walking over to him and kissing him silly. After a few moments, she settled on the latter.

At first he was unresponsive and stiff, in total shock as he found himself being pushed back against the organic wall of his TARDIS. The windows of the ship were glowing even brighter as energetic light grew in intensity within the heart of the ship.

Of course, even in a state of shock and not being able to quite reach physically as of yet, a Time Lord's brain was always firing on all cylinders. He could add together the basic factors of the circumstance, which included himself, another Time Lord and the fact that said person was kissing the former. After making this novice calculation, he quickly established cause and effect; as far as either he or this other person were aware, they were the last two of their kind. That was one cause. The secondary cause would probably be that between them, they equalled to one male and one female, and the tertiary cause was likely to be the instinctive, primal imperative to procreate, ergo, the effect was that either or both of them would be more than likely to desire sexual relations and, furthermore, offspring.

"Stop!" he yelled, surprising himself by saying it in their native language and by saying it a little louder than he had intended. He pushed her away gently, but strongly enough that she broke contact with his face. She stilled, her hands gripping his shoulders still, expression blank and lips rosy and kiss-red.

“Huh?” she questioned absently. She blinked a few times. “Oh, yeah, right. Uhh.” She cleared her throat, eyes going wide as if trying to stop herself from falling asleep. She glanced to where her hands were still gripping Gerard’s shoulders a little more tightly than he would have liked, and jerked them back as if she’d been burned. “Yeah. Okay.”

Gerard breathed deeply, finding some confidence in his newfound control over the situation. “I’m Gerard.”

She nodded appreciatively. “That’s nice.” She startled. “Oh, yes, sorry! Hayley,” she laughed out awkwardly.

“Hello Hayley,” he said to her, calm now that the psychic connection between him and her had established itself and settled down in the depths of his mind. “You look a little flustered. Come inside?”

She considered, lifting up onto her tip-toes to peer over his shoulder and through the window of his TARDIS. The windows were low enough that she could see the masses of tangled and unorganised wires and large coral formations and beams, reflecting a familiar glow, and she could see the central time-rotor undulating softly. “It looks like mine.”

“Type 43?”

“Yes!” she yelled a little more excitedly than she’d planned. She cleared her throat again. “Um, yes. Yes.”

Gerard smiled at her, and she smiled back. Her posture seemed to become more relaxed, and she sighed out a lungful of breath that she’d been subconsciously holding in. Gerard smiled again, this time with teeth, looking not at her eyes, but into them. She indulged herself with her own deep stare for a few moments, before snapping out of it suddenly.

“Don’t make me jump you again,” she warned him with a laugh, closing her eyes.

“Well, that would just be a disaster,” he said jokingly, and when she gaped at him for a few moments with a ‘you’re kidding’ expression, he added, “No, really. I think the universe might implode.”

She laughed out loud and took a few steps backwards, turning to close the door of her TARDIS. She turned back hesitantly, leaning against the ship’s outer hull. “Mine’s rusty.”

“So is mine!” he retorted defensively.

Her face went serious. “I want to see yours,” to which Gerard’s eyebrows shot up exponentially. She quickly corrected, “Your ship. I want to see your ship, Gerard.”

His smile returned to its beautiful, mellow state and he clicked the door to his ship open, swinging it backwards but not going inside. He welcomed her in with a traditional, flourishing gesture of the arms. She slowed momentarily as she passed him, her nose almost touching his, before he followed her inside.