Title A TARDIS In New York City

Author tinyrose65

Summary All Jack, Rose, and the Doctor wanted was a nice trip to New York. Of course, they jus had land smack-dab in the middle of an alien invasion, didn't they?. And what's with all the people in funny costumes? (Doctor/Rose, Jack)

Note So this will be a short story- 3 chapters and about 20 pages total on my Word document. I just wrote it for kicks and I'll be posting a chapter a week. Enjoy!

Disclaimer I don't own Doctor Who or the Avengers.

Rose woke up that morning excited for a new day and eager for something to do. She, the Doctor, and Jack had just left Cardiff and, after her confrontation with Mickey, she needed something to distract her. Anything. Thankfully, the Doctor almost always had something up his sleeve and he had no doubt picked up on her mood.

He and Jack were becoming increasingly good at that.

Rose's suspicions were confirmed when she opened up the wardrobe in her room to find that the TARDIS had already chosen an outfit for her: nothing other-worldly, though. Just simple, practical comfortable clothes that somehow still managed to be stylish. Her grin widened. The TARDIS knew her too well and no doubt she was in on whatever plans the Doctor had.

Changed and ready, Rose headed to the console room, but found it empty. She used her nose and followed the scent of breakfast to the kitchen. Sure enough, she found Jack and the Doctor already there, having coffee and tea respectively. They had already taken the liberty of setting out tea and toast for her.

"Ta," she said cheerfully as she plopped down into the chair and took a long swig of her tea. If there were any parts of her that hadn't woken up yet, they were awake now.

"You're up this morning," Jack said, trying to delicately tell her that she was in no way, shape, or form a morning person. Usually he and the Doctor had to drag her out of bed with the promise of something amazing to see.

"I just want to get goin'," Rose said through a mouthful of toast. She raised an eyebrow at the Doctor. "What've you got planned, then?"

He tried to look innocent. "What makes you think I've got something planned?"

"The TARDIS picked out my clothes this mornin'," Rose said smartly. Jack eyed her up and down: the white v-neck t-shirt, army green jacket, worn jeans that hugged her in all the right places, and boots. He gave her a dirty grin.

"And she certainly did a good job," he said easily. Rose rolled her eyes good naturedly, but blushed all the same. She'd never have to worry about having self-confidence issues with him around, she decided.

"Humans," the Doctor grumbled. "Barely breakfast and you're already havin' a flirt."

"I could flirt with you, too, Doctor," Jack told him eagerly. "Would that make you feel any better?"

"Not really. No." The Doctor took a final swig of his tea. "If you're both done, we can get goin'."

"I knew we were going somewhere special!" Rose said gleefully. She shoved the rest of her toast in her mouth ("Charming," the Doctor drawled) and wiped the crumbs away. The Doctor lead the way to the console room and began to tinker with the controls.

"So?" she said eagerly. "Where we goin'?"

"New York!" he said proudly. "In the 28th century, mind you. Thought we could use a nice breather."

"What's so special about the 28th century?" Jack couldn't help but ask curiously. The Doctor got a manic grin on his face, the one that Rose had come to love.

"Let's find out!" He pulled a lever and Rose and Jack were thrown to ground as the ship jerked. Rose didn't bother trying to get up. It was much safer down here, anyway. Instead, she watched amusedly as Jack struggled to climb to his feet, only to be sent flying backwards again.

She giggled and somehow Jack managed to hear her over the roar of the TARDIS. He shot an annoyed glare her way, which she promptly ignored in favor of wrapping her arm around the base of one of the coral struts for support. Of course, the moment she finally found a semi-comfortable and semi-safe position, the TARDIS stilled.

"Here we are, then," the Doctor announced, straightening his jacket and then going over to help Rose up. She brushed herself off, relieved to see that she hadn't gotten hurt at all during that flight. She was getting better at this!

Jack on the other hand-

Rose giggled again as he staggered upright, looking as though he had been stomped on by a stampede of wild buffalo. He looked at one of the screens in the console room to quickly fix his hair, then fixed his clothes, and then grinned at them.

"Ready when you are!"

It was Rose who had the honor of opening the TARDIS doors this time. She had never been to New York, after all, and the one time she had been to America, a Dalek had tried to kill her. She stepped outside and couldn't help but frown. They had ended up in a dimly lit alleyway, surrounded by buildings on all three sides, leaving a space barely big enough for the TARDIS to land in. A large rat (Rose almost mistook it for a dog, in the dim light) skittered out of the way and a pigeon watched them blearily from its perch on a dumpster. From what Rose could see, this place didn't look very futuristic.

"This looks like the New York I see on the telly and stuff," she said, confused. Surely it would've changed in several hundred years. Maybe had some sort of fancy trash-system, instead of a smelly dump in an alley.

The Doctor looked baffled himself as he stepped outside and scowled at the dumpster next to him. Jack pulled out his vortex manipulator (it couldn't take him anywhere anymore, thanks to the Doctor, but it was still dead useful for scanning things) and the Doctor examined readings on the sonic screwdriver.

"21st century," he sighed. "I don't understand! I entered the coordinates perfectly!"

"Well clearly you didn't," Jack argued, looking up from his wrist, "Or else we wouldn't be here right now."

The Doctor narrowed his eyes. "Oi! It's not my fault when the TARDIS decides not to listen to me! She's stubborn, the old girl is."

Rose, deciding to leave them bickering about whether it was the Doctor's horrible driving or the TARDIS's stubbornness that got them into this mess, walked outside the alley, expecting to see New York in all its 21st century glory.

What she saw instead-

"Doctor! Jack!" she yelled, eyes wide. Something in her voice must have told them that whatever it was was serious, because they stopped arguing immediately and rushed to her side.

"Hell's bells and buckets of blood," Jack muttered. Rose agreed with the sentiment entirely.

New York (or at least this part of it) was completely destroyed. Buildings were on fire, sidewalks cracked, and off in the distance she could see the chaos of a panicked crowd and overwhelmed police force.

Oh, and the aliens.

They were dressed in metallic body suits, flying around on small hover-craft like things that reminded Rose of the flying bikes that the Doctor had taken her to see on Droxy-279. They had weapons and were hostile (that much was obvious by the way they kept blowing up buildings).

There were also the big aliens: large, metal, fish like things that swam almost leisurely through the sky.

"Do you recognize the species?" Rose asked, keeping her voice as calm as possible. She was with the Doctor and Jack, after all, the two people she trusted more than anybody else in the world, and the three of them did this sort of thing at least four times a week.

"Can't be sure unless I get a closer look, but I'd guess the Chitauri," the Doctor said, as the three of them moved back a bit in the alley when an explosion hit a bit too close for comfort. Rose didn't bother asking why they hadn't done anything yet. She could tell the Doctor was still formulating some sort of plan.

"What the hell are they doing here?" Jack asked wildly as the Doctor pulled open a backdoor to one of the buildings in the alley.

The three darted inside and the Doctor soniced the door shut. They would be safer here. The building itself looked like a restaurant and the three found themselves in an abandoned kitchen. No doubt everybody else had high-tailed it when the monsters showed up.

"You've heard of 'em, too?" Rose demanded, feeling a bit out of the loop. She had never seen aliens like that before in her life.

"They're reptilian humanoids," Jack rattled off, trying remember what he had learnt about them at the Time-Agency. Most agents got just a general rundown of alien species. More particular information was given on a mission-by-mission basis.

"Advanced technology. A neural-link to their mother ship. Rumor has it they're shape-shifters, too, but it's hard to tell for certain."

"They also consider themselves to be the immune system of the universe," the Doctor added as they headed from the kitchen to the front of the restaurant. The Doctor shut all of the blinds, made sure the windows and doors were secure, and then turned to face his companions. "Wiping out disorder and chaos where they see fit."

"Like Reapers?" Rose asked, watching one of the massive fish-things swim right by as she peaked through one of the windows.

"If you like," the Doctor said, "But they aren't time sensitive. Mostly they use that whole "immune system" lark as an excuse to take over any planet whose tech they think is worth something to 'em."

"Then why Earth?" Rose asked. She watched as one of the Chitauri flew by in his hovercraft-like skimmer. "They definitely seem way more advanced than us."

"No idea," the Doctor said. "We can figure that bit out later. For now, we need to stop 'em from destroying the rest of Manhattan."

"Any ideas?" Jack asked. The Doctor didn't say anything, still watching, looking for any sort of weakness-

It was pure luck that Rose happened to see it, really. She was just following the path that one of the aliens was taking.

The TARDIS apparently had known what she was doing this morning. She had landed them almost directly under what looked like a massive hole in the sky, covering several blocks, from the looks of was from there that all of the aliens were coming. A bright blue beam shone from the top of a building a few streets away, looking as though it were tearing apart the fabric of the Universe itself.

Rose tugged on the Doctor's jacket and pointed. "What's that thing?"

"Looks to be a portal of some kind," the Doctor said briskly, already in saving-the-world mode. Jack was loading up his blaster. "Before we deal with the aliens we've got here, we need to shut it down, or else they'll just keep coming."

Jack clicked a few buttons on his vortex manipulator. A 3D model of the city popped up, and Jack flicked his fingers to turn it. It showed the building they were at. "Here we are."

"The portal seems to be originating from here," the Doctor said, reaching up to move the model. It zoomed in on a tall building a few blocks away.

"I don't believe it!" Jack said, looking oddly like a kid in a candy-store. "The portal is originating from Stark Tower!"

The Doctor looked at him blankly and Rose wrinkled her nose. "Isn't he some sorta billionaire inventor?"

"He's Ironman!" Jack said, as though Rose should be publicly shamed for not knowing, never mind that traveling with the Doctor meant she was hardly up to date on news from her time. She could much more easily tell you the history of Raxicoricofallapatorius than what was goin' on in her time period.

The Doctor seemed to recognize the name and he looked mildly impressed. "O' course! It'd be around this time the Avengers Initiative started back up, then. 2012, again, Rose."

"Who's Ironman and what's the Avengers Initiative?" Rose interrupted. Honestly. She loved having Jack on board the TARDIS, but sometimes it got a bit annoying when they started talking about tech or aliens or whatever and she was stuck trying to play catch-up.

Thankfully, they were always more than happy to explain.

"The Avengers Initiative is a perfect example of you humans adapting to life's funny little curveballs, Rose!" The Doctor said. "Started out as a government project by this group called S.H.I.E.L.D: gather up all the humans on the planet with special quirks and abilities- super-strength, intelligence, and so on- and pack 'em into one, big, monster fighting team!"

"Of course," Jack added, "Story goes that they weren't too happy about some of the things S.H.I.E.L.D. was doing behind the scenes, so they broke free and formed the Avengers: Ironman- who happens to that billionaire you mentioned, Captain America, Thor, the Hulk, the Black-Widow, and Hawkeye!"

"So what you're saying is that we've landed in one of Mickey's comic-books?" Rose said dumbly, not really sure how to process the information.

"The Time Agency started out as a branch of S.H.I.E.L.D., didn't it?" The Doctor mused, not bothering to dignify Rose's question with an answer.

Jack nodded eagerly, a massive grin on his face. "I grew up hearing stories about the Avengers! Oh, ho! This is brilliant! Do you think I'll get to meet them?"

"Maybe after we've saved the world, lad," the Doctor grinned, flicking the hologram of the city that Rose had almost completely forgotten about. The Doctor however, had been thinking the whole time, and he outlined the best possible path to the tower.

"Good coverage," Jack agreed, retracing the route on the screen, just to be sure he knew it well enough.

"Stay out of sight?" Rose guessed

"And out of the range of any blasters," Jack confirmed.

"Right then," Rose said, taking a deep breath.

"On your mark, Doctor," Jack said, firmly, blaster in hand.

"Fantastic!" he beamed. Then he took Rose's hand and the three of them ran out into the streets. They had been somewhat protected in the alley and the noise had been muffled, too. Now, though, they were completely exposed and Rose knew it was only a matter of time before the Chitauri saw them.

The Doctor, of course, knew exactly where they were going and, like Jack had said, used a combination of buildings and back streets and alleys to keep them out of sight. Eventually, though, they reached a point where they would have no choice but run into the open.

The Doctor glanced around the corner at the entrance to Stark Tower and then turned behind him to Rose and Jack, who were pressed tightly to the wall of the shop they were hiding behind. "It's a straight shot from here to the Tower, alright?"

"Alright," Rose agreed breathlessly. Jack, who was behind her, looked down at her.

"How're you holding up?"

"Alright," Rose said again. The Doctor frowned.

"We can always get you back to the TARDIS, if you want. No need for you to be putting yourself in harm's way if you don't want to be."

Rose laughed. "Are you kiddin'? I live for this! Wouldn't miss it for the world!"

The Doctor smiled at her then, a smile touched with genuine joy and affection and something else that Rose would never name for fear of ruining everything. She could return the smile, though, and she did, and Jack looked between the two of them and wondered if they realized how lucky they were. It wasn't often that you found love like the one those two had.

All he had to do now was get them in a closet together. Or maybe a bed. Either one would work.

First, though...

"You two go on without me," he instructed. Rose and the Doctor broke their little staring contest to gape at him.

"What're you talking about, Jack?" Rose gasped. He grinned at her, genuinely touched by her concern. He had no idea what he'd done to deserve friends like this, but he had been taught never to look a gift horse in the mouth.

"There're civilians out there," Jack gestured to some of the buildings near them. "I can't just leave them to fend for themselves."

"Good man," the Doctor said proudly. "Alright, then. You work on protecting the civilians. Me and Rose will figure out a way to close that portal."

Rose wondered what use she'd be to the Doctor, but didn't question it. If he wanted her there, he had a good reason, she was sure of it. So she gave Jack a kiss on the cheek for good luck.

"You missed," he joked, pouting theatrically, telling Rose exactly where he wanted Rose to kiss him next time. Rose smiled.

"Come back in one piece and I'll see what I can do to fix that," she ordered. Jack saluted, promising her without words that he'd do the best he could to stay safe, and then he darted off to one of the office buildings.

"Let's go save the world, then," the Doctor told her.

"Again," Rose added, taking his offered hand.

Then, they ran.

AN: Enjoy! The next chapter will be up next week.

tinyrose65