You can call it what you want: prolific, creative, tenacious. I'm choosing NOT to think about it as a prodigious lack of desire to do the actual work that's plaguing me and giving me spring fever, even though that's exactly what it is.

But fresh on the heels of finishing my "Little Angels" story here is my next offering. It came about while listening to a song by the Shirelles.

It is a stand-alone. It is totally, completely, 100% a "ship" fic, and the sci-fi/adventure elements are simply an excuse to push the real action forward. It is, as usual, Martha and Ten, but their relationship is canon. Angsty, longing companion travels alongside a thick, clueless Doctor. You know the drill.

Again, this will not be epic... it's just a toe-dipper. Enjoy.

**

"Tonight you're mine completely / You give your love so sweetly…

Tonight the light of love is your eyes / But will you love me tomorrow?

Is this a lasting treasure? / Or just a moment's pleasure?

Can I believe the magic of your sigh? / Will you still love me tomorrow?

I'd like to know that your love / Is love I can be sure of

So tell me now, and I won't ask again…"

**

These were the moments that both made her life worth living, and made it miserable. It was a moment she would almost certainly never be able to tell anyone about because, frankly, who would believe it?

A giant robot had stepped on the Chief Soothsayer of the planet Lewogue, crushing her ribs, and was now dragging her away. She was Nayovi, one of the kindest, cleverest beings Martha Jones had ever met. She buried her face in the Doctor's sleeve in order to stifle a scream, as the crunch echoed through the space.

"Casualties of war," he sighed, putting his arm around her. "Are you all right?"

She nodded, wondering if she might vomit, but the feeling quickly passed. It was replaced by another feeling, almost as woozy, and lately almost as unpleasant.

He has his arm around me.

"Bloody Lewogue," he spat. "A war of philosophy rages for five thousand years between a planet of machines and a planet of clairvoyants, you'd think that the beings capable of logic would recognise the inherent stalemate in that scenario and have the good sense to try to end it, but noooo!"

"Five thousand years?"

"Well, technically four-thousand-eight hundred and twenty one," he said. "No, hold on… twenty two. And about every eighty or so, the Cheh-Tim Automatons attack this planet and ravage it," he explained. "That's why it's not exactly a booming metropolis."

"Why don't they just leave?" she asked.

"Pride," he said harshly. He looked at her with steely brown eyes. "Because they have to be right."

The robots were destructive but thick, and the time travellers had managed not to alert them to their presence. Suddenly, they heard Nayovi groan, and Martha and the Doctor locked eyes. Their vantage point was round the corner of some kind of abandoned shed, and from there, they could watch Nayovi being taken God knew where, but now they knew that she was alive. The look on Martha's face was one of determination and resilience, cleverness, and in her eyes, the Doctor read volumes. He groaned inwardly, because he knew what she was about to do, and he knew he couldn't stop her. Worse, he knew that it was the right thing for her to do, and it was why he liked her.

"Okay, but listen to me, Martha, you stay out of sight!" he ordered her. "Do you what you have to do, but don't let them catch you. And wait for your moment – it's going to take me a few minutes to get to the control room!"

"Fine," she said, making to run.

"Wait!" he said, grabbing her arm. "Her skeletal structure is like yours and mine, but she doesn't have a liver, so be careful what you give her – if it's the wrong drug, it won't filter."

"Got it," she said, trying to run again.

He caught her arm once more. "And! Her clairvoyance is linked to cognition, and it's not rooted in time, it's much more changeable, and fragile like glass, not like you, so…"

"… make sure her ribs haven't punctured her lungs as first priority, so she doesn't go without oxygen and damage her brain – I get it! Now let me go!"

"Wow, you're clever. Be careful, Martha!"

By the time he'd finished talking, she was already running, heading for a lengthy canopy that ran along the side of the alleyway of the abandoned industrial park, about five feet off the ground. She was glad to be short, for once, as she only had to duck slightly to run along the inside and stay hidden from the Cheh-Tim giant.

She followed the robot and its victim round several corners, down streets, into alleys, twists, bends and turns. After perhaps a mile, suddenly, the robot let go of Nayovi, and let her limp body fall grotesquely to the pavement.

And then it just stood, staring at nothing, doing nothing.

The Doctor had made it into the control room of the Cheh-Tim spacecraft, and he'd used the buttons and levers and the robot's link with its ship to stop it moving. He'd told her to wait for her moment – now was her moment, though it was not ideal, and not, she knew, the situation the Doctor had had in mind for her. But even he was not perfect, and clearly something had gone wrong with his plan, and he wasn't able to get the robot out of the way just now.

So, even though the robot was still there, even though the danger had not necessarily passed, she had to act. She knew she wouldn't be able to get Nayovi to safety, not without help, but if she didn't work extremely quickly, the soothsayer would perish.

She ran out into the street and knelt beside the dying woman. She didn't want to move her too much because her ribs were likely very, very broken, but the Doctor had pointed out that unobstructing the lungs needed to come first. So Martha turned Nayovi onto her stomach, doing her best not to bend the body. She propped up Nayovi's chin with her hand, and patted her back.

"Nayovi? Nayovi, can you hear me?"

When there was no response, Martha reached down and opened Nayovi's eyes with her fingers. She repeated, "Nayovi? Say something if you can hear me."

"Mmmm," was all that the limp woman could muster, but it let Martha know that she was alive. She still had a long way to go, but it was better than the alternative. She coughed, and as she did, blood came from her mouth.

That meant a punctured lung. That meant probable lack of oxygen to the brain, fairly soon. That meant Lewogue could very well lose its most trusted clairvoyant, even if she survived.

"Martha? Martha are you out there?" came the Doctor's voice, seemingly from nowhere.

"Yeah! Where are you?"

"I'm still in the control room. I'm having some trouble with the robot – I've got it stopped, but the retreat function is deadlocked. I can't get it to activate with the sonic! Looks like they saw me coming."

"How are you doing this?"

"Through the robot's connection with the ship," he answered. "Which means, if you can hear me, you're way too close to the thing."

"I don't have a choice, Doctor!"

"Martha, get her away from the robot right now!"

Martha sighed with exasperation. "Doctor, she's coughing up blood and her ribs are shattered! I can't just drag her out of here."

"Well, you need to do something because the control panel has a countdown on it, and in twenty seconds, the robot comes back to life and the remote system goes into deadlock as a safety feature and there will be nothing more I can do."

She screamed out in frustration, and finally said, "Okay! Come and help me!"

"I can't, Martha, I have to evacuate the city! If I can't stop the attack, then I have to get everyone out of here. This lot are stubborn, but they're not stupid, maybe…."

He continued to talk, but she stopped listening. She wanted to whine Doctor, please don't leave me alone, but she knew it would be a selfish thing to do, and she was afraid it would not work. Worse than that, she thought it might incur the one thing she didn't want: his disapproval. Her independence had always been something he had admired in her, even though, ironically, her desire to win his favour and to work at his side, just to be near him, was the very thing that drove her. These desires – well, he simply wasn't aware of them.

Or maybe he was, and he just chose to ignore them. That thought, even at a desperate moment like this one, gave Martha a cold shiver. To love, and not be loved in return... well, she had never known true heartache until she'd met the Doctor. She'd never known true love until then either, and she supposed now that to have the latter meant risking the former.

But what if he really didn't know? The Doctor was many things, but he wasn't a mind-reader, at least not from a distance, and, she admitted to herself, she had gone to great lengths to hide her feelings from him. She didn't really entertain any notion that he felt the same way about her, but what if there was a possibility there? What if there was a tiny bit of potential that she was throwing away? A spark that could perhaps be fanned with the right kind of care, a soft touch, some gentle encouragement? What if he was totally blind – could she help him see? Did the fact that he didn't love her mean that they couldn't be together? Already, they were very much together – they shared their lives with one another, why not their feelings? Why not some moments of intimacy, a mental space, why not a bed? Most people didn't begin in a relationship madly in love – they had to grow, earn it, learn to feel deeply about the other person. Was it really so strange to think that he could learn to love her if she took the initiative?

She knew she was just torturing herself, that these were the same thoughts she'd been having for months, ever since the Pentallian. They were nothing new – she loved the Doctor, nursed a hope, then she'd let it die again. At least this train of thought had evolved from simple acceptance of love and misery, which was a step in the right direction. Martha had always been taught never to accept less than the best. In her mind, she was fairly certain she knew the score; she was a good friend to him, and though she may harbour some strong feelings, he was in love with someone else and that was that. But sometimes, especially late into the night when she stared at the ceiling and felt cold all alone in her bed, her heart would win over and she felt she had to know. Was this really all that would ever exist between them, or would she someday be able to reach into the Doctor's soul and find more?

And sometimes those moments would strike at inconvenient times. Like now, on Lewogue, talking to the Doctor through the mouth of a giant robot with less than twenty seconds until disaster…

And then she realised that there was still a woman dying in the street, and still a giant robot counting standing three feet away, counting down to attack.

"Martha, focus!" she scolded herself aloud, just before jumping into action.