amberfocus | Caught in the Act

A/N: Just another Nine/Rose story I’m bringing over from Teaspoon. Part of the Ninuendoes and Miss Communication series. Crack!fic, I think. Maybe. Humor, fluff, innuendoes. No angst. There will be a chapter of Wolf Moon tonight, just waiting to get it back from my beta.

Caught in the Act

“Rose!” The sharp voice of the Doctor outside her bedroom door made Rose gasp and stop what she was doing. She heard her doorknob rattle and the Doctor’s grunt of anger when he banged into it. He’d expected it to be unlocked. Normally Rose didn’t bother with locking her door. Any door on the ship could be easily unlocked by the Doctor with his sonic screwdriver. But this time he couldn’t do that because--.

“Rose!”

“Yes, Doctor,” she said a little unsteadily.

“Have you seen my sonic screwdriver?”

He sounded incredibly annoyed. Well, she was annoyed, too. She didn’t particularly like being interrupted in the middle of things. He wanted her to be more self-sufficient after all. If she admitted that she’d taken it he just might yell at her again and she was still smarting from their earlier ‘conversation.’ But if she didn’t admit that she had it, and he found out she’d lied to him about it she might also get yelled at, only with his hurt look in place. She really couldn’t win.

“See it every day,” she hollered through the door. Really he pulled it out and waved it around at the slightest provocation. Rose had often wondered if it was a substitute for his--.

“Rose! Do we have to have this conversation through a closed door?” he bellowed.

Rose bit her lip and hastily got off the bed, slipping the sonic screwdriver underneath it. She walked over to the door and unlocked it and he barged through so fast that she nearly fell over trying to get out of his way.

“What were you doing that you needed to lock the door for?” he demanded suspiciously.

“Can’t a girl have a little privacy once in awhile, Doctor?” she asked as innocently as she could, but she knew at least half of her mouth was creeping into an uncontrollable smirk.

“Don’t like locked doors on my ship, Rose, you know that. What’ve ya been doing anyway? Jumpin’ Jacks? You’re all red and sweaty.” His eyes flitted around the room before coming to rest on her bed. “Don’t you ever make your bed?”

“Made it this mornin’,” Rose said. “Just so happens I messed it up again.”

He looked up towards the ceiling and then down at the bed and back at Rose’s face again. He scowled. “I know exactly what you’ve been doing,” he said accusingly, crossing his arms and giving her his penetrating glare. “And you’ve been using my sonic screwdriver to do it, too, haven’t ya?”

She blushed and looked away from him but his hand shot out and pulled her chin back so that she had to meet his gaze. “Well,” she mumbled, embarrassed, “You did say I needed to not depend on you so much. That I needed to learn to be more self-sufficient.”

“I didn’t mean for that, Rose,” he said. “I absolutely cannot believe you would use my special tool,” and Rose bit hard at her lip to keep herself from bursting out into totally inappropriate laughter at the comment, “Like…like that. And without askin’.”

“As if I’d ask you if I could use it for that…”

“Honestly, Rose, I wouldn’t have minded doing it for you if you’d just told me you needed it done,” he said. “Did you at least finish the job?” he asked.

Rose blushed again and closed her eyes tightly so she didn’t have to look at him. “No,” she squeaked.

“How close did you get?” he asked.

Did she really have to spell it out for him? Apparently she did. “I was…almost…done when you knocked,” she choked out.

“Well, where’d ya hide it? Least I can do is help you finish it.” Rose went to retrieve it, not quite willing to believe how surreal the conversation had gotten. Was he really going to do this? She hesitated and he walked over to the bed, taking the screwdriver in one hand and her hand in the other.

Gently he helped her onto the bed and scrambled up beside her, then watched as she stretched her full length to grasp the shelf she’d been busy putting up when he’d interrupted. She held it at the proper angle. “It’s just the end one that needs tightening and then it’s done,” she told him.

“Some things are better done with two,” he told her. “Putting up shelves is one of them.” He gave her a happy grin now that he had the tool firmly back in his possession. He tested the shelf and then said, “There, all done.”

The two of them plopped down on the bed. “Now, no more borrowing without askin’,” he said firmly.

“Yes, Doctor.”

“Anything else that needs doing while I’m in here?” he asked her.

“Just me,” she said with a mischievous grin. “What setting was it again that resonates concrete?”