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“Why is everything sexy, now,” the Doctor asked out loud of his time machine as she suddenly dimmed the lights and switched them to a more reddish hue.
The Doctor was leaning against the console, waiting for his wife to change her clothing. Apparently, they were going to a party somewhere. She didn't seem to care what he wore. Though, he had to admit, the red velvet coat was quite versatile.
River wasn't exactly caring about him at all right now anyway. He was just there to hold the King's head, which was, at that moment, face down, spitting fiery words of their impending doom into the TARDIS floor grates.
River Song finally made her entrance, and the Doctor suddenly understood why the TARDIS had shifted the color scheme. It was mood lighting. River stood at the top of the staircase in a dazzling dress, extravagantly sequined at the top, with a plunging neckline. The Time Lord swallowed hard, trying to keep his jaw from dropping.
She descended the stairs and the Doctor was having a hard time letting go of the console. He wasn't sure his legs could hold him up on their own. The Professor's eyebrow arched. He must look quite pained, he thought.
“Well,” she asked, stopping a few feet away from him.
“What,” he forced out.
“What do you think?”
Hell, he thought, he was rubbish with compliments as it was, but with her looking like that, he was finding that his mouth didn't have enough moisture to form words properly.
“Sparkly,” he managed. Her eyebrow arched even more.
“What,” she said, “that's it?”
His tongue finally loosened, but it wasn't doing him any favors.
“If you let your hair down, it might warm your shoulders up. You're going to catch a chill with all that skin exposed.”
River Song was not amused.
“Well then,” she said tauntingly, “I'll just have to find some sexy thing at the party who can warm me up properly.” She brushed passed him, forcing the Doctor to suck air through his teeth. She smelled amazing.
River started expertly imputing coordinates into the TARDIS navigation system.
“I can see you take your marriage vows very seriously,” he bit out, getting quite annoyed with his wife's promiscuous behavior up until this point.
“Morality, like art, means drawing a line someplace,” she answered, quoting Oscar Wilde with a naughty smirk.
The Doctor scoffed. “And you draw no lines?”
“I have no conscience.”
“You weren't that bad when we ran together,” the Doctor mumbled under his breath.
“Still insisting that you know me, are you,” she asked, her hearing apparently still amazing, and threw the TARDIS into flight. They both grabbed onto the console as she lurched into the vortex.
“Better than anyone,” he threw back, raising his voice.
King Hydroflax was starting to turn colors with his raging. He was also getting on the Doctor's nerves. The threats were completely ridiculous when tossed about by a bodiless individual. It would have made the Doctor laugh again, if he wasn't so distraught over his wife's lack of recognition.
“I highly doubt that-”
“Enough,” the Doctor shouted, finally having enough of the King's rant. He whipped out his new sonic screwdriver and silenced Hydroflax's voice modulator. The King was not deterred, continuing to threaten the destruction of the universe, but silently.
“...Sweetie,” River finished breathlessly.
The Doctor drew the monitor in front of himself and leaned against the console to read the final destination.
“Galactic starliner... Sounds a little too low-key for you, dear,” he grumped quietly. He was tired of the game. His hand still gripped the sonic. He didn't realize that River had moved to stand so closely to him, until he felt her fingers run along the sonic screwdriver and dance over the skin of his hand. He shivered with the contact.
“Hello,” he whispered, turning darkened eyes to look at his wife.
“Hello,” River whispered in return. Her voice was smokey and thick with emotion. Her eyes were bright with unshed tears. She could see him now, but still wasn't believing of the new face. River reached up and put her fingertips upon his cheek. He closed his eyes against her warm touch, leaning in slightly.
“How did it happen,” she asked.
“Undeservedly,” he answered, and meant it. As much as the Doctor feared dying, he still had no idea why he was always the one left standing.
“That will never be true, my love,” she said softly. The Doctor reached up and pulled her hand away from his face. His eyes were hard and his eyebrows came down in a thunderous glare.
“My love,” he questioned bitterly, “when just a moment ago you refused to see me at all?”
“Can you blame me, Doctor? Have you seen your face,” she asked with a twinkle in her eye.
“River...” he warned.
“Doctor, you were not supposed to have any more regenerations. How was I to know?”
He released her hand, shoved both of his into his pockets, and shrugged like a chastised child.
“I thought perhaps you would be able to see me anyway. After all we've been through together,” he said, realizing how ridiculous it sounded when spoken aloud.
“Oh, Doctor,” she said taking his face in both of her hands, and turning him toward her. “I am sorry. I've really put you through it, haven't I?”
He took her hands in his, pulling them away from his face again and holding them against his hearts.
“You're not actually a bit apologetic about it, River Song, so don't even start with me,” he warned, a bit of humor creeping back into his thick brogue.
“You know me too well.”
“That is what I said,” he reminded her.
“Yes, you did,” she whispered, and leaned in before he could protest. This regeneration had only met the lips of one other person, but the tingle that went from his lips to his toes in an instant, only happened when his thin lips met River Song's full red ones.
The Doctor's breath was caught in his throat as her warm mouth moved over his. He dropped his hands to his wife's hips, pulling her closer. Her hands slowly caressed into his gray curls, fisting them and deepening the kiss. Her tongue was hot against the inside of his mouth. The Doctor's skin was suddenly flushed and burning.
When they finally parted, both breathless and rosy-cheeked, they realized that everything was completely silent around them.
“Sweetie, can the King breath when his vocal modulator is suppressed,” River asked nonchalantly. They both whipped around in the direction of the disembodied head on the floor. The King's skin was blue.
The Doctor aimed his sonic at the head and released the King's vocal cords. A 'whoosh' of air filled the TARDIS console room. It didn't take much longer for King Hydroflax to come back to himself and start his raging right where he left off.
“We've landed,” River informed him.
“Oh! Thank you,” the Doctor exclaimed, shoving the head into it's bag and moving toward the doors, right behind his wife, and on to the next part of their adventure.