Office Work Is Boring

Rose hated being in the office. Couldn't stand paperwork and the endless list of financial claims and status updates she had to provide. She wanted to be out on the streets, tracking down aliens and discovering new worlds, not writing about the last time she did any of that which, unfortunately, was weeks ago. So, with a pressing need to do something, she set out to make office life more fun.

Her father hadn't taken well to using cubicles as a test firing range, although it did make it a lot more fun. Plenty of room to duck and cover. Next time they'd be more careful about not hitting the computers though.

When she tired of each crumpled paper she threw landing directly in the waste bin, she switched to paper airplanes. When she got too good with those, she moved the bin to the hall outside her office door. Passersby didn't seem appreciative of her creative efforts.

She found out that the building air ducts were horrendously filthy and longed for the future when air ducts were shiny clean aluminum, and the perfect size to crawl through. On the bright side she did find out about Mickey's fling with one of Torchwood's secretaries while she was stuck above the 27th floor break room.

When he wasn't snogging secretaries and knocking over creamer, Mickey was entirely too absorbed in his work. She said hi, commented on the weather outside and joked about hanging out for a good twenty minutes and he never bothered to turn around. With rolling eyes and a heavy sigh she'd climbed back up the rappel line she'd rigged to the roof to drop down and visit him.

The mail guy really didn't like holding her mail still while she cut them open with a katana... and the bosses were getting tired of getting their reports back with slices missing.

After enough practice, pencils thrown at the ceiling stuck on the first try. And she'd attuned her ears to catch the sound of wood and lead sliding past pressboard so that she could dodge them when they inevitably came back down. She was sure it would come in handy when dodging shots fired by hostile aliens. Her co-workers weren't so sure. Although when one caught Mickey on it's descent to the floor, he at least learned to follow her movements.

She really thought her popcorn ceiling camoflage was a fantastic and useful invention and couldn't understand how Jake couldn't see that when she dropped down from his office ceiling after hanging there for nearly an hour.

So, after a few months, even though she still hated paperwork, and waiting around to be sent out, she was keeping things interesting in the Torchood building. And, should aliens attack, taking out the elevators, and attacking with pencil shooting paper planes, she'd be ready to rappel down the side of the building, traverse through the air ducts to find them, then surprise them by hiding on the ceiling and slice their paper planes in half. And instead of her co-workers, she'd be the one laughing then.