[For River Song]

[st_illunsmeared]

The Honourable Miss Phryne Fisher was bored.

Not a murder, not a theft, not even a puzzle to test her wits for almost two weeks. She couldn't pack up and find adventure elsewhere. There wasn't even a decent party to distract herself with.

Oh, she supposed she could find a young man to entertain her, but what she had with Jack was so new and fresh, and he had taken so long to come around to it, she didn't care to exercise that particular freedom yet. Although if she had to take many more lukewarm showers, she might change her mind.

Regardless, she had no intention of being one of those women who, upon being bored, hung around the necks of their men like nooses. It wasn't Jack's job to entertain her, no matter how willing he might be. She would just have to find some way to entertain herself.

"Now," she said to the air as she strolled back toward the hotel after a bracing walk. "If you were an adventure hiding in this hotel, where would you be?"

Comments

[st_everybodylives]

"If you find one," River had overheard the other woman's comment as she walked past where the red head was sitting at a cafe table with her diary and called out. "And you don't want it, send it my way."

[st_illunsmeared]

Chuckling, Phryne angled her path toward the other woman. "If I find one, I might be inclined to share it, if it were big enough." She continued forward until she stood before the table. "It would have to be terribly large."

[st_everybodylives]

"At this point I would look forward to a tiny adventure, even one I had to share." River admitted, flipping her diary closed and gesturing to the empty chair across from her.

"Coffee? Tea? Something stronger?"

[st_illunsmeared]

"Champagne would be more conducive to locating an adventure," Phryne suggested mildly as she dropped into the empty chair. If it were to appear, she would drink it, but she didn't feel strongly enough about it to go for a bottle at the moment. "Phryne Fisher, lady detective. And you?"

[st_everybodylives]

The place wasn't quite magical enough for it to simply appear, but ever efficient River gestured to a member of the hotel staff nearby, and mouthed 'bubbly' at him before answering.

"Professor River Song," she went with the entire title. It had panache. "Archeologist."

[st_illunsmeared]

The presumed staff member (presumed because it was actually Sam Winchester, the staff being only five and none of them being present) made a face, his brows furrowing. But he did go to the counter and ask Kitty to bring them a bottle of champagne and two glasses.

"The Honourable Miss, properly," Phryne amended, since they were doing titles. "Just please tell me you're not an Egyptologist."

[st_everybodylives]

"No one would ever call me honorable." She said with a laugh. Anyone but River would apologize if she knew she'd inconvenienced Sam. River, not so much.

"I've been there, Egypt, but it wasn't my main field of study."

[st_illunsmeared]

"Inherited title," Phryne clarified with a small laugh. Professor River Song was a woman after her own heart. "I like to think it applies when it comes to giving my word, but only because I do it sparingly." She did prefer to be considered trustworthy--by people of significance anyway.

She gestured blithely and dismissed Egypt with a light, "As for Egypt, it's a fascinating place to visit. The last Egyptologist I meant was a terrible bore." A murderous psychopath, but she hardly felt a need to share that.

[st_everybodylives]

River on the other hand was a bit of a liar, compulsive. but such was the life she had led. She tried very hard never to tell the truth, except when it mattered.

Rule number 1, the Doctor lies - and so did River.

"You know, many of them are. Cleopatra, Nefertiti, mummies and pyramids and hidden treasures, curses... you'd think they would all be frightfully interesting. And yet they all manage to be terrible bores. I think it's because they think Egypt is the end all be all of archeological research and can't talk about anything else. I mean I like a nice mummy's curse as much as the next girl but must we talk about it over cocktails?"

[st_illunsmeared]

Phryne laughed in delighted astonishment. Her new companion had a lively wit and imagination. "Oh, absolutely not. I prefer a good murder, myself."

The attractive young woman who tended the bar and moved like a dancer delivered (and opened, rather deftly, it seeme to Phryne) a bottle of champagne and two glasses. She introduced herself as Kitty and then moved off again before either Phryne or her companion had a chance to speak.

"Well. Efficient, isn't she?"

[st_everybodylives]

"And intelligent," River commented watching Kitty go. "I've met her."

She poured them each a glass of the bubbly and considered. "Murder can be fun, but I prefer a nice heist, or tomb raiding."

[st_illunsmeared]

Discreet, as well, since she'd given no indication that she knew River Song. Professional courtesy, Phryne wondered, or had she forgotten? They hadn't been here long, any of them, so it wouldn't be surprising if she didn't recall everyone she'd met. A mystery, if a small one easily solved.

But this woman posed a larger one and Phryne frowned at her response. "I assume you mean to resolve and not to commit." And if she didn't, Phryne would have to tell Jack, promptly. Although she didn't suppose anyone would speak about murders so blithely...except Foyle, but he was a monster.

[st_everybodylives]

Well, they had met upon initial arrival, the younger woman may not remember her. River was just very good at faces - when your erstwhile spouse changed his like some men change socks you had to be.

"I try very hard not to be homicidal," the shrug was gallic and lightly done. There was a slight smile on her lips when she continued that implied that she was teasing. "Usually."

[st_illunsmeared]

"Dare I ask when you don't try?" Phryne posed the question lightly, a smile playing about the corners of her mouth. Her eyes sparkled, as though with mischief, but Jack and Dot would recognize the familiar sight of Phryne on the scent.

It wasn't that she suspected River Song of being a murderess, particularly. The woman simply had far too many secrets hidden in her teasing and lightness. No one who deployed wit the way either of them did learned by accident.

[st_everybodylives]

"Generally I try to kill my husband, not entirely my fault." There had been brainwashing, and frankly he could drive a woman to it.

She continued in a teasing tone.

"But it's been quite some time since that happened. He was alive and well when I left him before coming here." Teasing and truth.

[st_illunsmeared]

"Well, that's perfectly understandable then. What woman hasn't wanted to kill her husband from time to time?" Phryne offered lightly and felt her concern receding. There was a story there, she felt certain, but no immediate threat. She needn't chase down a perhaps painful memory just now.

"Except me, of course, since I haven't one." That was cheerily said with a wave of her champagne glass. "You seem to be taking the separation rather well."

[st_everybodylives]

Painful, but not as well.

"It's... complicated." River finally said in answer to the other woman's comment about dealing with the separation. "I love him, but good lord living with him can be a trial. We do better when our times together are brief."

She idly stroked the book, like a blue door, battered and papers sticking out at odd angles. "But memorable. I suppose you could say separation is a way of life."

Luckily she had long ago learned to live with being alone, and without the Doctor. So long as she knew she would see him again, and she would. Though she knew the day was coming when it would be the last time. Her journal was nearly full.

[st_illunsmeared]

"Brief but memorable is how I like nearly all of my involvement with men," came Phryne's quick response, although not as quick as it might ordinarily have been.

"Yet there are those," she allowed more slowly, gaze drawn to the battered blue book the other woman all but fondled. It piqued her curiosity, certainly, but Phryne had better manners than to snoop for snooping's sake. "With whom one wishes to append regular, or repeated, to brief and memorable."

One, in her experience. Jack. And Lin, she supposed, but that was more repeated than regular. She would tire of him if she had to spend too much time with him.

"Still, if what we're told is true and we're stuck here... well, I suppose it's best not to dwell, isn't it? At least not used to sharing his bed every night."

[st_everybodylives]

"I never dwell," but she did lie. She refilled her glass and sipped.

"And I don't believe we're stuck here, all prisons can be broken out of, you just have to find the right door." A pause and a smile flickered on her lips. "Or the right lipstick."

[st_illunsmeared]

"Well, then. To not dwelling and finding the precisely right shade of lipstick." Phryne raised her glass, and with a broad smile, leaned forward enough that they could toast. If perhaps she had reservations about Professor River Song, they certainly weren't to do with her sense of fun, or adventure.