iPod Challenge Fic
iPod Challenge
1. Pick a character/pairing.
2. Put your music player on shuffle.
3. Write a ficlet for each song that comes up. Your time limit for each story is the length of the song. Do not go over.
4. Do ten of these, then post them and invite others to do the same.
I. The Mountains Of Mourne - Keith Harkin (Celtic Thunder)
He took her to London, generations before she was born, while people from all over Europe were travelling in, trying to build a new, better life for themselves. They met with Aidan, a handsome eighteen year old from a small village in Ireland. He told them of his fiancé, Mary, who was still there, waiting for him to come home with news, with work and money and a place for them. Aidan told them of the letters he wrote her, of the stories he’d heard in London. It was nothing like he’d been told. There weren’t jobs everywhere-the ones that were available were quickly filled by men older and more experienced than him.
But as he admitted that he wouldn’t go home to Mary without something to make her happy, Amy slipped her hand into the Doctor’s and smiled. She knew the feeling.
II. All Right Now - Free
“Are you okay, Pond?” The Doctor eyed her curiously as she stood in the street, grinning at nothing.
“I’m fine,” she laughed. “I just... I can’t believe I’m here.”
“I’ve taken you to planets all over your galaxy and a dozen others. I’ve taken you to see ancient Venice, to see the UK in a hundred years, and you’re most excited by New York City on New Year’s Eve in 1999?”
“Doctor,” she said, her hazel eyes glittering. “You forget. I’m twenty-one. I can’t turn down a good party.” She gestured widely to the massive crowd around them as they stood in Times Square, the twilight just starting to fall and the people beginning to get excited. “And I’m pretty sure this one was probably the best my generation has ever and will ever see.”
“So you’re all right, then? You haven’t gone mad, standing there, smiling like you’ve just won the lottery even though, as far as I’m concerned, this is incredibly boring?”
Amy swatted at him as he watched her, a laugh forming in his throat when he backed away from her hand. “This is not boring. And wait until midnight. I’ll show you what a real party is.”
And when the clock changed over, and the crowd exploded in a shower of confetti, noise, and movement, Amy flung her arms around his neck and kissed him hard, thrilling when he actually kissed her back. Caught up in the moment or not, she was glad it wasn’t all on her part this time.
“You all right, Doctor?”
“I am now.”
III. Before I Speak - Kyle Riabko
Amy Pond didn’t like this. Not one bit. The Doctor had already decided to keep his distance, and they’d barely been travelling together two weeks. She wasn’t going to stand for it. Not when she’d waited fourteen years. Fourteen years.
“Doctor!” she cried one day, one afternoon when he wouldn’t listen to her, when he was babbling on and on and on about something she didn’t understand.
“What?!” he said, sounding more frustrated than he deserved to.
“Why are you avoiding being near me?”
“What?”
“Is that all you can say, Doctor?” she sniped, and it sounded way more obnoxious than she’d meant it to. “You know what I mean. Ever since I kissed you, you’ve been ignoring me. You didn’t give me a chance to explain before you backed off. I’m not okay with that, Doctor. You’re always going on and on about how I’m ‘the girl who waited’, and then you jump in and judge me on one impulsive movement. How dare you?”
The Doctor sighed and put his hands on the console, not looking at her. “Pond, I’m not judging you. I just...can’t be near you until I’ve sorted myself.”
“What?”
He raised an eyebrow in amusement. “You’re so quick to judge, Amelia,” he teased. “Did you ever think I might have to think about my feelings, too?”
IV. The Guilty Ones - Kyle Riabko (companion piece to Before I Speak)
Amy stared at him before acting impulsively. Again. She launched herself across the TARDIS, throwing herself into his arms and crushing her lips to his before he could speak. This was unknown. Crazy. But unbelievably sweet. Better than any of her dreams had ever been.
The Doctor clutched her, his hands tangling in her hair. She could feel his guilt in his kiss, but it didn’t stop him. His body was too involved to listen to his brain. She liked having this control over him. Her pulse raced, too, jumping all over the place, knowing it was so wrong but not caring at all. She let him take the lead, or at least let him believe he was, when he pushed her back against the console. His hands wandered the front of her t-shirt, brushing sensitive parts of her anatomy, setting her skin on fire.
“Amy,” he whispered, his voice sleek and cool. He so rarely called her that. It was amazing to hear his voice, lustful and heavy, using her name as they travelled through the sky, invisible to anyone who could judge them...
V. These Four Walls - Gavin Creel
The Doctor lie in Amy’s bed, feeling her asleep against his side. They’d done nothing he should be ashamed of, and for the first time, he wasn’t. He knew how Amy felt about him-he knew how he felt about her. But he also knew it could never be. At least, not outside the TARDIS.
When they were inside this box, this magical, ancient, brand-new box, he felt alive. He didn’t want to hide anything from Amy. He wanted to tell her everything, of everyone he’d loved and lost and hurt and saved. He wanted to tell her that while they stayed here, they were free to be happy and safe and loved and together.
He didn’t want to think about what it would be like once she left him. She would. They always did. But for now, he only wanted to think about being here, inside the TARDIS, with her. Always with her.
In here, they were always. They were forever. They were timeless and never ending and perfect. There was no Rory, no Rose, no past. Only the future. Only The Doctor and Amy. The magic, imaginary friend and the girl who waited.
He wrapped an arm around her and smiled as she sighed, her breath wafting over his chest. “Oh, Amelia,” he murmured softly, brushing his lips over her hair.
VI. Can’t Buy Me Love - The Beatles
“Doctor, why won’t you let me buy you a souvenir?”
“Pond, what makes you think I need a souvenir?”
She put a hand on her hip and quirked her head in that oh-so-Amy Pond way. “How do you remember all of these amazing places if you don’t pick up something to remind you?”
He wanted to tell her that his memories were more than enough. That he could close his eyes and remember her smile, her awe, her reaction to things that should have been so outside her reach. That she was his souvenir.
“I’m a Time Lord, Pond.” It was his default response. She never argued, and he didn’t have to explain.
VII. If Only - Hanson
Amy watched The Doctor as he tinkered away at the console. She was supposed to be reading the book he’d tossed at her, the one that would teach her what she needed to know about flying the TARDIS. After all, she’d asked. But she was distracted.
As always.
She was overwhelmed with the urge to tell him how she felt. Oh, she was sure he knew. He knew everything when it came to her. He must have had some psychic link to her brain or something. But did he know that she needed him? That she only made it those fourteen years because she knew she had to be there when he came back?
Did he know that she’d never actually been with another man because she wanted him to be her first? That she’d told Rory that she wanted to wait, not out of virtue but out of the hope that The Doctor would come back to her and sweep her into bed and give her the most romantic night of her life?
Rory. She loved him. She always had, really. Even when she dressed him up as The Doctor. But this was the actual Doctor. The one she’d waited for. And he didn’t seem to want anything to do with her in a romantic sense.
If only I had the guts to tell you, she thought.
And when he looked up as if he’d heard, she buried her head in the book.
If only she’d seen the look on his face when he glanced at her.
VIII. Dream A Little Dream - Kevin McHale
Amy liked to sit at the open TARDIS door and look at the stars. And when she did that, The Doctor would pretend to do other things, but he’d really be watching her. Silhouetted by stars and space breezes blowing her ginger hair around... It was the stuff of poetry, of love songs and sonnets.
Amy dreamt of him. He knew it. She’d doze off sitting beside him while he worked, or when a trip took a little longer than it should. She’d murmur his name, or subconsciously reach for his hand in her sleep, clutching his fingers like he was her last link to something real.
When she sat at her perch, he wondered if she was thinking of him. The stars reminded him of her, after all. Of the glitter in her eyes when she got excited. Of the sparkle in her smile when a particularly crazy idea came to her. Of the glow in her soul when the potential for danger made her dance with joy.
His crazy, star-filled dreamer. His Amy Pond was something special.
IX. Ballroom Blitz - Tia Carrere
It had been his idea to crash one of Casanova’s parties. Stupid, really. How could a man like Casanova turn down the fiery, beautiful Amy Pond? How could The Doctor have thought he wouldn’t get jealous?
It was never meant to become a fight, though. Or, scratch that. It was never meant to become Casanova chasing The Doctor around with a blade while Amy stood there laughing. “Pond, a little help, please?” he cried as he zoomed past her.
Amy threw her head back. “You started it, Doctor ” she cried. But she did finally speak up. In a way.
Grabbing him as he passed her again, she pulled him into a passionate kiss. He started to complain, but he could almost hear her thoughts. He won’t force a girl, Doctor. If I’m not interested, he’ll back off.
Behind them, The Doctor could hear Casanova stop short, his voice curt and disappointed. “It seems the lady has made her choice.”
Amy broke the embrace. “Yes. She has.”
X. Ready To Fall - Joey Fatone
The Doctor was in love with Amy Pond.
He supposed he’d known it since she admitted who she was back in Leadsworth.
He hadn’t really been in love with anyone since Rose, though he knew quite a few people had fallen for him since. But he didn’t think he could handle the heartbreak again, so he’d stayed back.
Falling for Amy was the stupidest thing he could have done. He couldn’t promise her anything. He couldn’t give her what she wanted. Amy was independent, strong, willful. But she was still a romantic. He knew that. And though he could love her as best as he could now, he’d have to leave her one day.
Plus, she had Rory. Oh, Rory.
But all of that faded when she walked into the console room.
She’d asked to attend Prince Charles’ and Princess Diana’s wedding. “Just to say I was there,” she said with a shy smile he’d never seen on her face before. Amy’s romantic side was showing, and who was he to deny her?
Now she stood before him in a beautiful green gown, her red hair piled on top of her head and held back with a delicate tiara. She looked very much like the royalty she’d have to pretend to be to pull off the ruse of being at the event.
“Amy...” he whispered.
She stepped up and straightened the bow tie around his neck and the lapels of his tuxedo. “Yes, Doctor?”
He lowered his lips to hers and kissed her, oh-so-softly.
He couldn’t promise her forever, but damn it, he’d try.
1. Pick a character/pairing.
2. Put your music player on shuffle.
3. Write a ficlet for each song that comes up. Your time limit for each story is the length of the song. Do not go over.
4. Do ten of these, then post them and invite others to do the same.
I. The Mountains Of Mourne - Keith Harkin (Celtic Thunder)
He took her to London, generations before she was born, while people from all over Europe were travelling in, trying to build a new, better life for themselves. They met with Aidan, a handsome eighteen year old from a small village in Ireland. He told them of his fiancé, Mary, who was still there, waiting for him to come home with news, with work and money and a place for them. Aidan told them of the letters he wrote her, of the stories he’d heard in London. It was nothing like he’d been told. There weren’t jobs everywhere-the ones that were available were quickly filled by men older and more experienced than him.
But as he admitted that he wouldn’t go home to Mary without something to make her happy, Amy slipped her hand into the Doctor’s and smiled. She knew the feeling.
II. All Right Now - Free
“Are you okay, Pond?” The Doctor eyed her curiously as she stood in the street, grinning at nothing.
“I’m fine,” she laughed. “I just... I can’t believe I’m here.”
“I’ve taken you to planets all over your galaxy and a dozen others. I’ve taken you to see ancient Venice, to see the UK in a hundred years, and you’re most excited by New York City on New Year’s Eve in 1999?”
“Doctor,” she said, her hazel eyes glittering. “You forget. I’m twenty-one. I can’t turn down a good party.” She gestured widely to the massive crowd around them as they stood in Times Square, the twilight just starting to fall and the people beginning to get excited. “And I’m pretty sure this one was probably the best my generation has ever and will ever see.”
“So you’re all right, then? You haven’t gone mad, standing there, smiling like you’ve just won the lottery even though, as far as I’m concerned, this is incredibly boring?”
Amy swatted at him as he watched her, a laugh forming in his throat when he backed away from her hand. “This is not boring. And wait until midnight. I’ll show you what a real party is.”
And when the clock changed over, and the crowd exploded in a shower of confetti, noise, and movement, Amy flung her arms around his neck and kissed him hard, thrilling when he actually kissed her back. Caught up in the moment or not, she was glad it wasn’t all on her part this time.
“You all right, Doctor?”
“I am now.”
III. Before I Speak - Kyle Riabko
Amy Pond didn’t like this. Not one bit. The Doctor had already decided to keep his distance, and they’d barely been travelling together two weeks. She wasn’t going to stand for it. Not when she’d waited fourteen years. Fourteen years.
“Doctor!” she cried one day, one afternoon when he wouldn’t listen to her, when he was babbling on and on and on about something she didn’t understand.
“What?!” he said, sounding more frustrated than he deserved to.
“Why are you avoiding being near me?”
“What?”
“Is that all you can say, Doctor?” she sniped, and it sounded way more obnoxious than she’d meant it to. “You know what I mean. Ever since I kissed you, you’ve been ignoring me. You didn’t give me a chance to explain before you backed off. I’m not okay with that, Doctor. You’re always going on and on about how I’m ‘the girl who waited’, and then you jump in and judge me on one impulsive movement. How dare you?”
The Doctor sighed and put his hands on the console, not looking at her. “Pond, I’m not judging you. I just...can’t be near you until I’ve sorted myself.”
“What?”
He raised an eyebrow in amusement. “You’re so quick to judge, Amelia,” he teased. “Did you ever think I might have to think about my feelings, too?”
IV. The Guilty Ones - Kyle Riabko (companion piece to Before I Speak)
Amy stared at him before acting impulsively. Again. She launched herself across the TARDIS, throwing herself into his arms and crushing her lips to his before he could speak. This was unknown. Crazy. But unbelievably sweet. Better than any of her dreams had ever been.
The Doctor clutched her, his hands tangling in her hair. She could feel his guilt in his kiss, but it didn’t stop him. His body was too involved to listen to his brain. She liked having this control over him. Her pulse raced, too, jumping all over the place, knowing it was so wrong but not caring at all. She let him take the lead, or at least let him believe he was, when he pushed her back against the console. His hands wandered the front of her t-shirt, brushing sensitive parts of her anatomy, setting her skin on fire.
“Amy,” he whispered, his voice sleek and cool. He so rarely called her that. It was amazing to hear his voice, lustful and heavy, using her name as they travelled through the sky, invisible to anyone who could judge them...
V. These Four Walls - Gavin Creel
The Doctor lie in Amy’s bed, feeling her asleep against his side. They’d done nothing he should be ashamed of, and for the first time, he wasn’t. He knew how Amy felt about him-he knew how he felt about her. But he also knew it could never be. At least, not outside the TARDIS.
When they were inside this box, this magical, ancient, brand-new box, he felt alive. He didn’t want to hide anything from Amy. He wanted to tell her everything, of everyone he’d loved and lost and hurt and saved. He wanted to tell her that while they stayed here, they were free to be happy and safe and loved and together.
He didn’t want to think about what it would be like once she left him. She would. They always did. But for now, he only wanted to think about being here, inside the TARDIS, with her. Always with her.
In here, they were always. They were forever. They were timeless and never ending and perfect. There was no Rory, no Rose, no past. Only the future. Only The Doctor and Amy. The magic, imaginary friend and the girl who waited.
He wrapped an arm around her and smiled as she sighed, her breath wafting over his chest. “Oh, Amelia,” he murmured softly, brushing his lips over her hair.
VI. Can’t Buy Me Love - The Beatles
“Doctor, why won’t you let me buy you a souvenir?”
“Pond, what makes you think I need a souvenir?”
She put a hand on her hip and quirked her head in that oh-so-Amy Pond way. “How do you remember all of these amazing places if you don’t pick up something to remind you?”
He wanted to tell her that his memories were more than enough. That he could close his eyes and remember her smile, her awe, her reaction to things that should have been so outside her reach. That she was his souvenir.
“I’m a Time Lord, Pond.” It was his default response. She never argued, and he didn’t have to explain.
VII. If Only - Hanson
Amy watched The Doctor as he tinkered away at the console. She was supposed to be reading the book he’d tossed at her, the one that would teach her what she needed to know about flying the TARDIS. After all, she’d asked. But she was distracted.
As always.
She was overwhelmed with the urge to tell him how she felt. Oh, she was sure he knew. He knew everything when it came to her. He must have had some psychic link to her brain or something. But did he know that she needed him? That she only made it those fourteen years because she knew she had to be there when he came back?
Did he know that she’d never actually been with another man because she wanted him to be her first? That she’d told Rory that she wanted to wait, not out of virtue but out of the hope that The Doctor would come back to her and sweep her into bed and give her the most romantic night of her life?
Rory. She loved him. She always had, really. Even when she dressed him up as The Doctor. But this was the actual Doctor. The one she’d waited for. And he didn’t seem to want anything to do with her in a romantic sense.
If only I had the guts to tell you, she thought.
And when he looked up as if he’d heard, she buried her head in the book.
If only she’d seen the look on his face when he glanced at her.
VIII. Dream A Little Dream - Kevin McHale
Amy liked to sit at the open TARDIS door and look at the stars. And when she did that, The Doctor would pretend to do other things, but he’d really be watching her. Silhouetted by stars and space breezes blowing her ginger hair around... It was the stuff of poetry, of love songs and sonnets.
Amy dreamt of him. He knew it. She’d doze off sitting beside him while he worked, or when a trip took a little longer than it should. She’d murmur his name, or subconsciously reach for his hand in her sleep, clutching his fingers like he was her last link to something real.
When she sat at her perch, he wondered if she was thinking of him. The stars reminded him of her, after all. Of the glitter in her eyes when she got excited. Of the sparkle in her smile when a particularly crazy idea came to her. Of the glow in her soul when the potential for danger made her dance with joy.
His crazy, star-filled dreamer. His Amy Pond was something special.
IX. Ballroom Blitz - Tia Carrere
It had been his idea to crash one of Casanova’s parties. Stupid, really. How could a man like Casanova turn down the fiery, beautiful Amy Pond? How could The Doctor have thought he wouldn’t get jealous?
It was never meant to become a fight, though. Or, scratch that. It was never meant to become Casanova chasing The Doctor around with a blade while Amy stood there laughing. “Pond, a little help, please?” he cried as he zoomed past her.
Amy threw her head back. “You started it, Doctor ” she cried. But she did finally speak up. In a way.
Grabbing him as he passed her again, she pulled him into a passionate kiss. He started to complain, but he could almost hear her thoughts. He won’t force a girl, Doctor. If I’m not interested, he’ll back off.
Behind them, The Doctor could hear Casanova stop short, his voice curt and disappointed. “It seems the lady has made her choice.”
Amy broke the embrace. “Yes. She has.”
X. Ready To Fall - Joey Fatone
The Doctor was in love with Amy Pond.
He supposed he’d known it since she admitted who she was back in Leadsworth.
He hadn’t really been in love with anyone since Rose, though he knew quite a few people had fallen for him since. But he didn’t think he could handle the heartbreak again, so he’d stayed back.
Falling for Amy was the stupidest thing he could have done. He couldn’t promise her anything. He couldn’t give her what she wanted. Amy was independent, strong, willful. But she was still a romantic. He knew that. And though he could love her as best as he could now, he’d have to leave her one day.
Plus, she had Rory. Oh, Rory.
But all of that faded when she walked into the console room.
She’d asked to attend Prince Charles’ and Princess Diana’s wedding. “Just to say I was there,” she said with a shy smile he’d never seen on her face before. Amy’s romantic side was showing, and who was he to deny her?
Now she stood before him in a beautiful green gown, her red hair piled on top of her head and held back with a delicate tiara. She looked very much like the royalty she’d have to pretend to be to pull off the ruse of being at the event.
“Amy...” he whispered.
She stepped up and straightened the bow tie around his neck and the lapels of his tuxedo. “Yes, Doctor?”
He lowered his lips to hers and kissed her, oh-so-softly.
He couldn’t promise her forever, but damn it, he’d try.