Prompt: kind of in the mood for some Alec Hardy/Donna.
Disclaimer: the only thing I own around here is my own personal angst.
A/N: written as a Christmas gift for serenityslady - this went more towards the angst then I had first anticipated. Perhaps I'll try another one later for you.

Gryphlon Aftermath

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A plain clothes police officer strolled over to the cliff top and peered down over it to the beach below as waves crashed onto the shoreline. He winced and stepped back reverently from the edge before gazing at the woman considering him thoughtfully from further back on the grassy summit. Pulling out his notebook, he sauntered over to her side.

"I believe you are the one who reported this incident," he began to say without any preamble.

The woman stared at him as her long ginger hair fluttered around and across her face. "I did," she confirmed, hardly missing a beat to expertly guide her hair out of her view. "The boy was lured over the edge."

"Lured? What makes you think that?" He peered at her inquisitively, wondering what she was getting at.

"It's a known feature of the Gryphlon race," she stated confidently. "I'm Donna, by the way, Donna Noble. Are you are?"

"Detective Inspector Hardy," he testily replied. Obviously another nut job was trying to get his attention.

She nodded back in acknowledgement. "Nice to meet you, detective inspector. You'll no doubt find little blue marks on the back of his neck to denote the point of contact where they feed. Nasty business really."

How he stopped himself from growling at her he would never know. "Does it amuse you that someone's child has been killed?"

"It is far from amusing. I have known the loss of my own four children," she grimly explained.

Donna then did something that really surprised him; she shuddered, her eyes rolled back into her head, and she sunk like a stone.

If it were not for the quick actions of DI Hardy reaching forward, she would have hit the ground hard. Instead he managed to catch her in order to guide her gently downwards. As he held her an electric charge shot up his arm, startling him; and he could have sworn there was a brief golden tinge to her skin.

Why him? Why did it always end up with him being stuck with the nutter? He pulled out his radio to call in for an ambulance when her hand suddenly shot up and gripped his wrist with vice like accuracy.

"Don't," she begged, her eyes still firmly shut. "The information will be gone soon, like footprints in the sand, the tide is coming in." Then she keeled over sideways, almost pinning him beneath her body.

"Bloody marvellous!" he sarcastically exclaimed. "Donna? Can you hear me, Donna? I can't move; you'll have to..."

But she wasn't budging an inch, let alone answering, and he found himself idly wondering how it must look to any passer-by who saw them. They probably thought it was a loving tryst.

Thankfully she started to rouse herself, clutching her head as though in pain before fixing her stern eyes on him. "What are you playing at?" she cried indignantly. "Move your scrawny arse away from me before I knock you into next week!"

Hardy couldn't believe what he was hearing. "You fell on me," he pointed out. "I couldn't get up."

Donna managed to edge herself onto her knees to try and sit up, and found she was gazing closely into his brown eyes. They seemed to be full of intense pain, the pale complexion and five o'clock shadow merely added to the sickly illusion. Not knowing fully why, she reached out a hand and briefly touched the centre of his chest before withdrawing. "They can fix that; don't be put off by the statistics," she murmured.

What?! He pulled back from her despite finding himself attracted to her unusual perfume and the contrast between her glittery blue eyes and translucent skin. "How did...?"

He didn't get the chance to ask any further because the world suddenly drew away from him as blood failed to pump oxygen around his body and his vision faded to nothing. All sensation was lost.

Fortunately Donna knew exactly what to do as his breathing stopped. Blowing gently into his mouth she then applied pressure to his chest as per her scuba diving training. It took a few goes, but she had him breathing again and in the recovery position by the time an ambulance turned up.

He couldn't be sure but the last thing she whispered to him before he was lifted away into the care of the paramedics was, "You saved me and I saved you. According to my culture we belong to each other now, Tin Star Man." It would remain in his head to bother him. Until he saw her again.

"A member of the public found you," DS Miller chastised him later on as he lay in a hospital bed hooked up to an oxygen tank and an IV. "You almost died."

'I did die,' he thought, 'but she saved me.' "What happened to her?"

"Who?" Miller stopped midway in the process of nicking one of the grapes she had dropped onto his bed.

He gritted his teeth and ground out, "The woman that saved me."

"That was no woman," Miller insisted, perplexed he should think so. "You were alone on the cliff top when they found you. What were you up to? Somebody walking their dog on the beach saw you collapse down onto the grass."

"But..." Hardy wasn't losing his mind, he just knew he wasn't. "What about the boy who went over the edge?"

"No one to report in any way." Miller was really concerned now. "Are you sure there was a boy?"

"Of course I'm sure! That Noble woman saw it happen," he wheezed out. "Donna Noble."

Outside in the corridor, unheard and unseen by anyone, silently watching him and Miller; Donna unconsciously gripped the Tardis key around her neck and giggled to herself in suppressed glee. Soon she would return to him, for him, and claim him back.