amberfocus | Andromeda Rising: Chapter Two

A/N: We meet two more of the Doctor and Rose's children and Andromeda's note is discovered. Meanwhile Andromeda and Jack depart Deneb 8 on the Orion Cutlass.

Chapter Two: Leave it All Behind

Ten-year-old Xanderius Tyler wandered into the console room of his parent’s TARDIS. As the youngest of Rose and the Doctor’s children he was seldom allowed in there without supervision, simply because he’d once managed to disassemble the time rotor in four and a half minutes when he was eight. It never seemed to matter to his parents that it had only taken him twelve minutes to put it back together. Correctly. Even his dad wasn’t that fast.

He grinned with glee as he noticed its unattended state. The TARDIS hummed warningly at him as he approached her console. “Don’t worry,” he said aloud. “I’m not taking you apart. I just want to look at some of the switches.” He couldn’t help it if he’d been born with an extremely strong innate sense of curiosity.

Unlike the rest of his siblings, Xan did not favor either Rose or the Doctor. In point of fact he looked most like his grandfather Pete, with his pale ginger blond hair and blue eyes. But when he concentrated he’d poke his tongue to the left side between his teeth, and he had his father’s predilection for pacing when he was trying to suss out a problem.

He frowned when he saw the paper taped to the time rotor. Had his parents gone out? Is that why the room was unattended? He had thought they were simply having ‘private time,’ assuming he and his sister were asleep. He reached out and pulled the note down from the console and read it.

“Oh, crap,” he said. He ran down the corridor and pounded on his parents’ bedroom door. “Mum!” He hollered. “Mum, Dad! Andromeda’s run away!”

The Doctor and Rose, who had indeed been having private time, hastily dressed and opened the door. “What’s going on, Xan?” Rose asked. Her youngest child handed her the note he’d found. Her eyes scanned over her granddaughter’s neat scrawl.

Dear Gran and Granddad–

Please tell my mother that I’m off to explore the universe on my own. She might think not letting me have a TARDIS is going to keep me safe and under her thumb but she’s wrong. I’m of age and I’m going, TARDIS or no. I love you both very much. Tell my father I love him. Kiss Dev, Rafe, Xan, Tegan and Mars for me. I’ll check in with you when I can. I’m not checking in with her.

Dromee

“Oh, great,” sighed Rose. "I knew something like this was going to happen. That girl’s almost as headstrong as her mother.” She looked at her son. “Xan, go wake up Teganna.”

“Oh, do I have to? You know what she’s like when she doesn’t get enough sleep,” Xan protested.

“Now, Xan. It’s an emergency.”

Xan nodded mutely and went off to get his sister, the sibling of his who required the greatest amount of sleep due to the genetic structure of her hybridization. The Doctor and Rose strode to the console room. “Cassi’s going to have kittens,” said Rose.

“Serve her right. If Andromeda had been allowed to bond with a TARDIS we’d know where she was right now. It would have a tracker on it. As it is, we don’t know what’s happening to her,” the Doctor said.

“Oh, we know well enough. She’s sixteen. This is when she runs off and meets Jack,” said Rose.

“No, we just know she meets him when she’s sixteen. Anything could happen to her between now and when she runs into him.”

Rose didn’t like to think about that. “At least we know she’ll be okay eventually,” she mused. “That’s something anyway.”

A grumpy, blinking Teganna stumbled into the control room, Xan at her heels. “What going on?” She mumbled, yawning without covering her mouth. She stretched and then focused her sleepy eyes on her parents. “Xan said Dromee’s run off?” Her hand crept up to tangle in her golden brown hair. At fifteen, she was their youngest daughter and the one most like Rose, her face almost identical, though she, too had Pete Tyler’s blue eyes. She was also the closest in the family in age to Andromeda, besides Marsden, of course. She was definitely the closest female confidant of the other girl.

“She left a note. Did she say anything to you about running away, Tegan?” the Doctor asked.

“No. Ask Mars. He’s spent more time with her this vacation as you won’t let me go to the clubs yet,” she said, a bit of a pout in her voice.

“You have to be sixteen to go to the clubs here, you know that,” said Rose absently. “They won’t even let you in without a genetic scan to determine your age.”

“They will if you look like I do,” she muttered.

“And just how do you know that, Miss?” the Doctor asked.

“Dromee told me they hadn’t scanned her or Mars at all. Since I look like her I could have gotten in easily enough.” At her mother’s look she added, “But I didn’t.” She sighed and rubbed at her eyes. “Why would she run away? She’s getting her TARDIS tomorrow and…” She trailed off at the looks her parents directed at her.

“Cassi didn’t think she was old enough to have one. She won’t allow it,” the Doctor explained.

“Big sis has a screw loose,” said Teganna. “What’s her problem?”

“She’s just being Cassi,” sighed Rose.

“Have you told her yet?” Teganna asked.

“No, we’re just going to. Can you keep an eye on Xan? And then we may need you to babysit the rest of your nieces and nephews for awhile.”

“I don’t need looking after,” said Xan, who had climbed up one of the support struts and was sitting straddle-legged across the Y.

“Yes, you do,” both parents and Tegan said in unison.

“We may not be back for awhile. Keep your phone on. We’ll update you if we find anything out.”

Hand in hand Rose and the Doctor walked out of the TARDIS and made their way to Cassi’s ship. An impatient rap on the door was met by Philia opening it herself. They walked inside and Rose immediately started calling for her daughter.

“Cassi? Cassi!”

Cassi appeared a moment later, followed by Daniel. “Mum, Dad, what are you doing here?”

“Andromeda’s run off,” said the Doctor tightly. “She left a note.”

He handed it to his daughter and watched her face drain of color as she read the note. “We have to find her.”

“She’s a smart girl. She can take care of herself,” Daniel said gently.

“She’s just a kid,” said Cassi.

“She’s fully grown, Cassi,” said the Doctor. “I know you don’t want to admit that but it’s true.”

“Oh, shut it,” said Cassi. “I don’t need a lecture from you. We need to find my daughter.”

“I wouldn’t even know where to look,” said Rose.

“We’ll ask Mars. He’s been with her all week. He’ll know where to start,” said Daniel, taking charge. He led the way to Dare and Martha’s TARDIS.

As the Orion Cutlass left its docking port Andromeda stared out at the stars. The shuttle up to the space station had been exhilarating but this was better in a different way. A thrill raced through her. It was so exciting to choose her own destinations and not be saddled with what her parents wanted to see.

She sensed Jack’s presence behind her before she saw him. “Beautiful, isn’t it? I never get tired of the stars in this system,” he said.

“It’s lovely,” she said. She reached back and felt his hand touch hers, his fingers curling about her own, that strange little jolt of electricity racing through her. She still couldn’t believe she was doing this. She sighed in contentment.

Jack watched her reflection in the window wondering how on Deneb he’d managed to get tangled up with this girl. She was so young, not his usual type, and he was just extremely grateful that she was eighteen. He’d been attracted to people before, obviously, and he grinned at that, but there was something different about Andromeda. She sparked something deep within him.

He wasn’t the sort to hold someone’s hand unless he was leading that person straight to bed. And that was something that usually happened within the first twenty-four hours of meeting. This girl was different. He was almost afraid to rush her into anything. And only part of it was because she was young. No, with her there was a gut-level instinct that he needed to move slowly lest he scare her away. The very idea of scaring her away terrified him.

It was ridiculous. He’d only known her for eight hours and yet here he was booked on a space cruise of many light years determined to spend the next six months of leave time showing her the wonders of the universe if she’d let him. There was just something right about her, as if he had known her his whole life.

He looked down at their joint hands, marveling at the little jolts of fire that seemed to be pulsing up his arm from the contact. He wondered what the non-human part of her was. Something that channeled electricity perhaps? Because whatever it was, it was repeatedly firing his nerve-endings. Not that it was a bad sensation but it could interfere with his ability to concentrate.

Fortunately on leave he wouldn’t need to concentrate all that much. “Hungry?” he made himself ask.

“Starving,” she said.

“Come on, there’s some restaurants on deck eleven.” She smiled at him and a strange sense of familiarity washed through him again.

She followed him to the anti-gravity tube. “Have you ever been in one of these before?” he asked her.

“No.”

“They’re easy. You just step out into air and then you press the button for up or down and it’ll puff out air that will send you in the right direction.” He stepped out into mid-air and after a brief second’s hesitation she allowed him to pull her in beside him. When he’d indicated up to the tube she felt the soft warm air pressure blowing them upwards. It was a little bit like flying, though the absence of gravity was odd.

They stepped onto the lobby of deck eleven and she followed Jack over to a map of the floor. “See anything you like?” he asked. When she glanced at him and gave a slow smile, he found himself blushing. What was up with that? Jack Harkness did not blush. Even if Jack Harkness was an alias, not a real person, none of his personas blushed.

“I think I’d like the seafood restaurant from Divo,” she said. “Best ma’acali in the universe, according to my Gran.”

“Sounds good.” He committed the map of the floor plan to his memory and led her down the appropriate corridor. The restaurant was called the Heart of Divo and it was done up in an underwater theme. Appropriate given that it was a water planet with just a scattering of islands and only one major landmass, smaller than Australia on Earth.

“This is just gorgeous,” she said looking all around her as they were seated and handed menus. She looked at the walls which were a giant aquarium. Even the ceiling and the floor was filled with water and sea life. He reached out and took her hand across the table. He really didnt like not being in contact with her.

“They do have the option of swimming in the tanks if you’re interested in doing that at some point,” Jack told her.

“Sounds like a lot of fun. My grandparents took me to Divo when I was thirteen. It’s amazing for scuba diving and snorkeling. The reefs are made of blue and green coral and the fish are amazing. I saw colors there I never knew existed. A bit like the outer gaseous cloud of the Scarlett cluster.” The waiter stopped by their table and took their order.

“You sound well-travelled,” Jack commented when the waiter had left.

“I grew up on a ship,” she admitted. “We were always travelling. Don’t have a home planet, really. Well, there’s Earth where my Gran’s parents still live but I never lived there. Mum didn’t like the time period and…” She trailed off as she realized what she’d just said.

Jack stared at her in amazement as she looked anywhere but at him. If he had understood her little slip correctly, and he was sure he had, she’d meant time travel. She was far too young to be Time Agency and they certainly didn’t encourage their agents to bring family members on missions. What could she have meant? He didn’t think there were other humans that had time travel capability. The agency was pretty militant about controlling it.

He knew other species sometimes managed to travel in time. It was rare but it happened. Maybe whatever it was that made up her non-human component had access to the technology. Or maybe it was one of those species that simply phased through time. There weren’t many of those but he knew of at least three that existed.

“I grew up on the Boeshane Peninsula on the planet Boeotia. A nothing little backwater place that no one’s ever heard of. Growing up on a planet is no big deal. I think I’d have been happier growing up on a ship myself,” he said, finally filling the awkward silence. He found himself idly stroking the inside of her palm with his fingers and smiled at the way she was starting to squirm in her seat.

She seemed relieved when the waiter set down their meal on the table and she was able to pull her hand away without offending him and yet at the same time seemed reluctant to let go. He grinned at the wonderful contradictions of the girl before him.

As they ate they fell into an easy chatter about places they’d visited that they had in common and places they were interested in going that neither one had seen before. When the dessert menu was offered to them, they perused it readily.

“Ooo, do you like chocolate?” Andromeda asked him suddenly.

“Doesn’t everyone?”

“My mum doesn’t,” she said darkly.

“Well, I do.”

“You want to split this?” She tapped the menu. “It’s called Chocolate Suicide Swirl.” She read the little story that went with it. “Apparently it was so good when it was first created it caused the entire population of the continent Revat to attempt suicide when it was withdrawn from the general public during a bakers’ strike. Needless to say the strike didn’t last long after the bakers’ wants were given in to. They fiddled with the recipe a bit after that to curb the withdrawal symptoms. But that’s how it got its name.”

“Sounds delicious.” He didn’t really care how good it was or wasn’t. All he could think of in his head at the moment was the possibility of spooning the dessert into her mouth, watching the way her lips closed over the spoon. Oh, he had it bad. And it amazed him just how good that felt.

He leaned back against the booth, stretching out his long legs, accidently brushing against hers. She startled at the feel of his leg moving along her own and her eyes widened at the heat that rose up. It wasn’t as intense as the skin on skin contact of their hands but it still was noticeable. What was she doing to him? And why was he content to just let it happen?

When the dessert came he boldly dipped his spoon into the gooey mess first and offered her a taste. When her eyes fluttered shut and she gave a little moan inapproval of the dessert he just about lost his control. Fiercely he clamped down on it. He was not going to scare this girl away. Her eyes opened and she blushed when she saw how he was looking at her.

Hesitantly she scooped her own spoon into the chocolate and held it out to him. Well, he had to admit it had been worth the moan and the eyes closing. His own involuntary response told him that. When an intense heat washed through him he grabbed up the dessert menu and read through the description of their choice. He found what he had feared, the little asterisk at the end. She must not have noticed it. She’d never turned the menu over. He did and found the key.

Chocolate Suicide Swirl was also an aphrodisiac.

Ch. 3: http://amberfocus.livejournal.com/73018.html