Long Live Sarah Jane Smith
So, I have a rule: don't write fanfiction. It's hard enough understanding my own characters half the time, let alone ones that are incredibly complicated or - in the case of the Tenth Doctor - a bit nuts (in a good way). But. This idea stuck in my head and I couldn't get rid of it (not that I wanted to, necessarily). So, in what I wrote in about 5 hours, this is my send-off to one of the greatest companions who ever met the Doctor.
'So this is what the end looks like. White. Not even pearly gates! Like a bloody sheet of paper!'
Sarah Jane Smith sighed. Really, it was one of the more trivial things in her existence - non-existence? - at this point, but. When you reach the end, after traveling across all of time and space, gallivanting across the universe with this man, this amazing, impossible man, well... you expect a little bit more than just endless white... nothing. It's a bit disappointing, really. Granted, with what she's seen, she admitted to herself, anything would be a disappointment, but still. Daleks and Time Lords and Mummies and the Cybermen and the Loch Ness Monster. But now? At the end? To reach it and have... this? Spotless, pristine boredom for all eternity? She would go mad!
And that's how it always had been. Adventures and running around and... and how it would never be again. 'Never again,' the words echoed in her mind - and out into the void, it felt like - bringing a pang of sadness, of utter despair to her heart. It had been velvet smoking jackets and colored scarves, trainers, brainy specs, K-9 ('Affirmative, Mistress!') and Mr. Smith and the kids... Oh Luke... Not since the Doctor had left her - the first time, mind you - that she'd felt this bad.
And the Doctor. When he'd left the first time, there was something to look forward to. A life, a career, a home. Not that she expected to be some sit-at-home wife and knit for the rest of her life, but grandkids weren't out of the question, were they?
'Something to tell the grandkids.
'Oh, I think it'll be someone else's grandkids now.'
"Oh, that's just not even fair," she sniffed, annoyed that her thoughts refusing to stay internalized and how she sounded like the girl - young woman, she chided, even now - that hadn't yet snuck into UNIT and been a stowaway on the TARDIS. At least her thoughts could have the decency to leave her alone, not just taunt her with memories of her greatest friend.
She sniffed again, anger and emotion and just heart-wrenching sorrow bubbling out of her as tears streamed down her face. "Or at least bring something good back with you!"
"I guess you'll just have to settle for me."
No. Now she's imaging things, she figured at the voice behind her. Because he said goodbye and she even met the new one. 'Endless, boring, and cruel,' she thought, not even caring to dab her eyes or look up until something with color crossed in front of her. And she looked up, and there he was, with this pointy hair and nerd-chic and that smirk of his. And even then, she wasn't sure that this all wasn't some delusion of her brain. Not until he spoke.
"A tear, Sarah Jane?"
That impossible man. And for once in her life, Sarah Jane Smith was speechless.
"I-" she blinked, cautiously almost, afraid if she closed her eyes that he'd disappear from her again. "But you-" Sarah Jane cleared her throat, determined that even if this was some hallucination or whatnot, she wasn't going to sound like some blubbering idiot. Well, mostly. "You're, well, I'm, ah..."
"Dead?" The Doctor offered, far too cheerfully.
"...yes."
The Doctor grinned, almost smugly, in spite of her flat tone and blinking expression. "Correctamundo!" He frowned. "I wasn't going to use that word again, now why did that-"
Oh no. If she let him get off on a tangent, there was no telling when he'd come back. And this time, she was getting answers. "This isn't all some... dream? Or something?" Normally, it'd be delusional to hold onto even a slim hope at this point. But two things went against that count for her. She'd seen far worse and come back from it - and this was the one man in all creation that could do it.
"Nope!" Not that he was necessarily helping her very much at the moment.
"So," she began, trying very hard to keep her voice level. And decide whether she wanted to weep, kill him, or just laugh. Mostly in that order. "Then I'm really dead."
He just smirked, thrusting hands into the pockets of his blue-and-red-pinstriped suit, and rocked on his heels a bit. "You always were one of the brighter ones, Sarah Jane. I mean, really, there's been some whiz kids, but mostly they just want to talk about quantum physics or help the Sontarans try and poison the atmosph-
Apparently, without telling anyone or trying to reach a consensus, her heart had just decided that weeping was the best she could come up with. She didn't even realize it herself until her eyes starting burning and her vision blurred. "Doctor! That's it! That's the end! I'm dead!"
"Now, hold on-"
"And you!" Even as his expression softened and he tried to step in closer, her voice rose, both in volume and pitch. "You're not even real! You're just some figment or, or monster or the Trickster, getting in one last laugh at my old, lonely Sarah Jane Smith!" The thing-that-looked-like-the-Doctor kept a hint of the same smile as before, but it was tucked behind a hurt expression - the same one that he would show when his brainy specs failed to impress. And really, whoever it was, they were really good at that expression too.
"I," he began, leaning forward with his hands still tucked in his pockets speaking in a serious, deliberate tone, as if discussing the weather. "Am most definitely not a figment."
"Hah!" She swiped at her eyes, a straining sense of defiance giving her a little fire back. "Whatever you are, you're not certainly real. And definitely not the Doctor."
"Oh reeeeeeeaaaaally?" He asked, stretching into the word into a few extra syllables than necessary. "And why's that?"
"Because he regenerated," she stated matter-of-fact as she could, like she would tell some corrupt MP that they were through once her headline printed. "He doesn't even have this face any more." A bitter, humorous laugh escaped her lips. "He keeps getting younger and I just keep... kept... getting older..."
Sarah Jane cleared her throat. "But yes. You aren't him."
"I'm not?" The Doctor-lookalike asked, eyebrows raised high.
"Yes." She nodded, then shook her head. "I mean, no, you're not. Because he- this Doctor is gone. And I'm..." she swallowed back a particularly feisty lump in her throat. "I'm dead. And if you were real, I wouldn't be. But I am. And the story's over. Nothing left to tell, no husband, no family, no grandkids, no one to be remembered by-"
"Oh, Sarah Jane." She stopped, eyes watering anew. Not because his tone was sharp or teasing, but because of how sad he sounded. "How could you ever think that?"
"Be-because you-" She swallowed again. She had faced Daleks and Cybermen. She had traveled time and space. And this face, the face of the impossible man was turning into her a pile of very undignified jelly. Again. She really hated that.
"I mean, really?" He asked, the wit that made the sharpest rapier look dull by mere comparison returning, even those his expression stayed gentle. "Don't you remember what you said before I left you in South Croydon?"
"Aberdeen," she responded automatically, sniffling.
He winced, looking down for a moment. "Yes, well, it's the thought that counts." The man who looked like the Doctor took his hands out of his pockets and took hers, and gave her that smile. "You said 'don't forget me' - and really, who could? You leave quite an impression on things."
"I-"
"Ah, ah!" The man held up a finger and gave her a look that said 'shush, I'm on a roll' before taking her hand again. "You said 'don't forget me' and I most definitely did not forget you, Sarah Jane Smith. And K-9? And the Brigadier? UNIT and Skaro, the Cybermen and the Skarasen and Harry Sullivan? Oh, Sarah, no one could forget you."
She opened her mouth again, only for him to raise an eyebrow and she found herself shutting it.
"But you doubt and wonder all you want, because that is exactly who you are!" She blinked back confusion and some tears at the shift towards a more manic tone took hold. "You stepped out of the TARDIS and started having adventures all your own on that little blue planet! You poked around, stuck your nose in everything, built a supercomputer, I mean, wow!" His hands was warm and comforting, and despite herself she couldn't help but think that maybe- "You saved the world a dozen times over. You stood up to the most vile, vicious creatures across all of history. You were brilliant, from start to finish. Oh, Sarah Jane Smith. No one could ever forget you."
It was him. "...Doctor?" That smile, the grin that threatened to split his head open from ear to ear, said everything she needed to hear. She launched herself into his arms, not caring any more for holding back tears. "It is you!"
She couldn't quite explain how long it was that she held onto him - and vice versa, when she thought about it. It didn't really matter, she decided about a millisecond in. He was here and that was what mattered. And it wasn't for a good, long while that she dared to even loosen her arms around him or move her head from where it was buried in his neck. Damn this impossible man for making her like this. And damn him for making it feel so good. And when she did finally let him part - something that seemed more of a mutual thing than one or the other pulling away - she wiped away at tear stains, pleased to see she wasn't the only one with wet eyes.
"So," she began again, a sad smile on her face this time. "Then I'm really dead."
"Well," the Doctor began, moving to stand beside her with an arm around her shoulder. "Yeeeeaaah. But you think that's the end?"
She raised her eyebrows skeptically at him. "Doctor, I know you might think that time isn't a straight- what'd you call it?"
"A big ball of timey-whimey, wibbly-wobbly stuff," he said seamlessly, with an air of intelligence despite the technical proficiency of a 12 year-old.
"Right, that. But, death is, well, kind of permanent."
"Oh, sure," he said, shrugging, head tilting to the side a bit. The last Time Lord shrugged at her. Sarah Jane couldn't keep a small smile from appearing on her face at the thought of that. "I mean, if you want to think about it purely from a living versus not living perspective." Her look turned questioning pretty quickly at that, though the smile remained - if only for hearing him explain such things again.
"For one," he said, his hand held out like holding a piece of fruit. "Not being physically alive is hardly the end of things. Come on, don't you remember what I told you? Luminous beings, are we, not this crude matter." He paused, frowning. "Hang on a minute, that's Yoda."
She grinned, trying hard not to fall into uncontrollable laughter at his presence and his tone and his everything. It was a tonic, the antithesis of the despair that had threatened to crush her before. Which, she thought, summed up the Doctor's existence nicely.
"Two, you don't think you have grandkids?" He was smirking at her again while her newly-returned confidence faltered at the choice of topic. "With the amount of times you've saved the world over the last forty years, any one still alive on planet Earth is practically your grandchild. Good lord, if there was a pension system based on that, you could buy half of Spain. And I don't mean the dusty, dry half either."
"Well, yes," Sarah Jane stuttered, fumbling for a response, her face coloring quickly. "I meant that-"
"Something a bit more direct?" The Doctor asked, grinning cheekily at her. "Luke, that brilliant boy of yours, in what can only be described as one of the most capable pairings in humankind's history, is mentored-"
"Hold on, wait a second." Sarah Jane frowned, eyebrows furrowed almost in a glare at the Doctor. "I thought you weren't supposed to go picking at futures."
The Doctor just grinned like a kid in a candy store. "Yes, and just who are we going to tell?"
She blinked at him. "Oh." And then she did something very much un-Sarah Jane-like. She giggled. "Oh!
He just kept grinning, giving her shoulders a squeeze. "Luke meets up with the Brigadier after he gets out of college and starts putting that brain into use. Within the next three decades, UNIT is not only eradicating diseases by the dozen, but setting up a galactic embassy on the Moon.
"Rani, the dear girl, takes after you - she becomes one of the premier journalists of the 21st century, personally responsible for bringing down three corrupt governments, covering the official first contact with an alien race, and firsthand reporting on the peace summit that ends World War III.
"Clyde becomes a regular Renaissance man." Sarah Jane couldn't help but giggle at the Doctor's heavily accented pronunciation of 'Ray-ne-sawnce.' "His art works hang in the Louvre next to the Mona Lisa and Von Gogh, his culinary products are the talk of anyone with a decent set of taste buds, and did you know he plays violin?" She shook her head in response. "Neither did he! But apparently, the London Symphony Orchestra thinks he's spectacular."
"Maria, you know how she was helping aliens hide from the American government? Well, when first contact is made, she becomes one of the loudest voices for equality without regards to species." The Doctor grinned, looking very much like a proud father himself. "And when the U.S. Constitution is amended to allow foreign-born citizens to run for President, she is elected in a landslide. By the end of her first year in office, she signs into law the basis of Earth's Open Skies policy, welcoming refugees from across the stars and starting humanity down the road towards being one of great benefactor races of all civilization."
"Amy Pond and Rory- have you met them?"
"Yes, the, uh... new you... introduced me, just after the 'funeral' for your death." Sarah Jane chewed on her lip for a moment, her brain running in circles. Keeping up with the Doctor was a whole different level of logic. "Er. His death."
"Ugh, dreadful mess that was," he said, rolling his eyes. "He's a good one, the new me, but he's a bit of a space case sometimes." The Doctor tapped the side of his own head, winking a bit. "Anyway, they name their first child after you - Sarah Jane Pond. Doesn't quite have the same ring to it, but Amy's insistent and we know who wears the pants in that relationship.
"And years later, down the road, the great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-" the Doctor took in a deep breath, bringing another bubbling grin to her lips. "great-great-granddaughter - well, she becomes a noble!"
Her mouth hung open in surprise. "No!"
His just grinned wider. "Yes! The Lady Sarah Jane Smith-Pond - apparently her line and Luke's met up somewhere in the middle - of New London, New Earth. Well, technically, it's New New New Newnewnewnewnew London. And she actually helps save Amy, Rory, and me - the new me - from a group of lizard-cat things. Very dicey."
Sarah Jane just stared at him for a moment, still trying to process everything. "I... the Lady Sarah Jane Smith?"
The Doctor nodded vigorously. "Dame of the Realm, Queen of New Britain, known for her grace and wisdom in the rebuilding of New Earth after being wiped out by the Bliss plague. Held up as one of humanity's finest examples of courage and compassion." He hugged her shoulders again, waggling his eyebrows with a grin. "Just like her great-great-great- well you get the idea, grandmother."
Sarah Jane flushed again, having to avoid eye contact for a solid ten seconds before she could compose herself enough to speak. "Thank you."
"Thank me?" The Doctor shot back, still grinning. "It's your offspring, plus or minus a few dozen generations, that saves me. And besides," he added, stopping in his tracks and helping her come steady when she followed suit. "For everything that you've done for me, I think I still owe you a few, Sarah Jane Smith."
Blinking back tears, she laughed lightly, wiping at her eyes and finding the Doctor's grin infectious. "Well, I'm not sure how I'm going to collect exactly now," she gestured expansively with the hand not around the Doctor - which had happened somehow along their walk.
The Doctor put his hand to his face. "Oh, that's right! The third thing! How could I forget!"
Sarah Jane just looked at him quizzically, feeling almost at home with his apparent absent-mindedness. "Forget? Forget what?"
He removed his arm from her shoulders and stepped out in front of her, his expression torn between that boyish grin and an attempt to keep it contained, like he had a surprise for her. The Doctor held up his hand and with a quiet, echoing sound, snapped his fingers.
She raised an eyebrow at him, opening her mouth to wonder if he'd lost what few marbles he had before frowning. There was a noise... a noise that sounded familiar... and it dawned on her a moment later, that it was the most wonderful noise she had ever heard in her life.
rrrnt! - rrrnt! - rrrnt!
And blinking into existence, behind the impossible man, was his impossible, improbable time machine, that wonderful blue police box. And there he was, the Doctor, holding his hand out to her with the TARDIS standing open behind him and with a smile that could light up the universe.
"Come on, Sarah Jane. The adventures are just beginning."
RIP Elisabeth Sladen. May your greatest adventures be still to come.