This fic was written for a prompt given by the lovely femme_slash_fan on LiveJournal: Barbara/Ian, Kiss The Girl (bonus cookies if Vicki/Susan actually say it). Many thanks to her ^_^ Title comes from a line from Sting's song "Send Your Love". Enjoy!

When he joins her, his heart starts rumbling in his chest, faster than it ever has throughout this whole adventure. It isn't that the latter has failed to provide its share of sensations, though. He still feels a bit breathless, adrenaline pumping through his veins—his body heated and keenly aware of its surroundings, like that of an animal. He must look messy, and so does Barbara—her hair is a havoc, a tiny cut left a speck of blood upon her cheek. The sight of that is what makes his emotions boil, way past their usual level.

"Are you all right?" he asks as he brushes the redness from her face, and his heart rate does not decrease at the velvet softness of the touch—far from it.

She smiles at him, that little, knowing smile of hers, ever so familiar. "I'm fine, Ian. Are you?"

"Of course." He smiles back as he slowly takes away his hand.

"Good then," she says with a small sigh that somehow manages to sound weary and cheerful at the same time. "Eventful day again, wasn't it?"

"You might call it that. Quite the life we have now." He chuckles.

They laugh together, quietly, just standing there before the ship. The Doctor has long since trotted off inside and the locals have eventually moved back to their own pressing businesses after biding them farewell. They are quite alone, and they just share a smile, a shiny-eyed look. How simple those things are.

"Oh goodness, you are not going to stand here all night, are you?" calls a loud, youthful voice that makes them both jump. "Will you kiss the girl already!" Vicki flits past them and into the TARDIS, pigtails bouncing as she whirls back towards them. "Oh, honestly. Just do it!" she exclaims before disappearing inside.

"Of all the times not to remain joined at the hip with the Doctor, she would pick this one," he blurts out after a few seconds of bewilderment.

Barbara laughs, and he couldn't feel incensed if he tried. "Yes, I thought she was inside with him too!"

"Ah, that girl." He tuts fondly, shaking his head. "Forward little thing for sure."

"She is, certainly, but lovely at heart. Sometimes it cannot hurt, I suppose."

"Oh, surely." He looks Barbara in the eye. "But there are things she doesn't quite get."

She smiles that serene smile, with its teasing edge, and he feels the thrill run sharply down his spine and into his bones. "Of course there are. Still…"

He smiles back a slow, crooked grin. "Think the Doctor won't leave with the ship and forget about us?"

"Oh no, I'm quite sure he wouldn't by now," she speaks with certainty, and he nods.

The movement brings their heads that much closer. He might have been aiming for her cheek at first. He certainly isn't now.

Their mouths meet like a long-cherished promise, quiet and warm and inviting. It is brief, and just a little clumsy too, from emotion and much expectation. Their eyes meet when they draw apart, and they laugh again in wonder. Then they lean in once more.

This time he loses track of time, and everything that is not Barbara's soft lips and the shape of her in his arms and the hot sunlight that is now rushing through his veins along with blood. He pays no mind to his surroundings, and thus the approaching footsteps elude him at first. There might have been a distant call, muffled—"Doctor, really, wait!"—but then it is "Oh, dear, dear, dear!", too close altogether.

That he does hear.

They stumble apart. Vicki sends them an apologetic grimace—or she visibly tries to, although she is grinning much too hard to manage a suitably sheepish look—and the Doctor backs off like he has just had to witness a coupling of monkeys.

"Oh, dear, dear, dear," he stumbles over the words. "Well, do come back into the ship when you're done. But don't take all night! Oh, goodness, come along, child, don't just stand there and gawk."

Vicki bursts out laughing as she swiftly runs off after him. Ian and Barbara share a disbelieving look; but then the corners of her mouth start twitching helplessly, and soon they cannot help giggling as well.

This is a day of much nervous laughter, apparently—yet he will remember it for a wholly other reason.

"Remind me how we put up with these two?" he jokes.

"I have no idea sometimes, but no reservations either. Thank god we know how to handle him," Barbara replies. "Shall we go back in before he gets really worked up?"

"Yes, all right." He pauses. "We'll just have to seek more privacy next time."

She half-turns back to smile radiantly at him, a smile that makes his toes curl just so.

They enter the ship hand in hand. Amazingly, no one comments on that.