Story: Five Times Sarah Lied to the Doctor About Harry
Author:
lost_spookRating: All ages / PG
Word Count: 1250
Characters/Pairings: Fourth Doctor, Sarah Jane Smith, Harry Sullivan (Harry/Sarah>
Warnings: None
Summary: The Doctor has his suspicions, oh yes...
For
akashasheiress who said I would never write a fic about Sarah and Harry trying to hide their relationship from the Doctor for that Fic I Would Never Write meme. Naturally, owning a twisted mind, I wondered what sort of relationship… And then stopped and made it at least a little bit shippy.
I don’t know why it took so long to type up, though. I wrote it ages ago now. However, with a bit of effort, I made it in the same year! Happy New Year to all!
***
One
“Sarah,” said the Doctor. “I demand to know exactly what’s going on around here these days.”
She was eating what (she hoped) were cornflakes in what passed for a kitchen in the TARDIS. “Mmph?”
“Oh, I’ve noticed,” he said, sitting on the chair opposite, if sitting could be used to describe the way he sprawled over the chair and somehow seemed to occupy all the corners of the room at the same time. “Don’t think I haven’t.”
“Noticed what, Doctor?”
He tapped his nose.
“Well, I can’t tell you what’s going on around here if you won’t even hint as to what you think it is that’s going on, can I?” she responded, taking another mouthful and returning to a Strand Magazine she’d found in the library.
“You and Harry,” he said, and then added, leaning forward with an abruptness that nearly caused her to choke on her cereal. “Holding hands. Hah. Yes, I’ve seen you.”
Sarah looked back at him, and if the Doctor had been in an observant mood, which he wasn’t, he would have noted the slight raise of her chin and the smallest spark that lit her dark eyes. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Well, it’s not on, I tell you,” he said. “You always used to hold my hand!”
She became the picture of innocence now, stirring the yellow flakes around in the milk with her spoon. “Did I?”
“And now you hold his.”
“I expect he happened to be, well, handier.”
“Hah!”
She sighed. “Oh, all right, Doctor, but you must promise you won’t tell.”
“Oh, absolutely. Discretion is my middle name. Of course, the vicar objected, but -.”
Sarah frowned at him. “Doctor, I refuse to believe you were christened C of E, so please stop talking nonsense and I shall explain.”
“I could have been,” he muttered, but subsided. “Well? This had better be good.”
She laughed at him. “Harry’s not used to all these different planets and horrible monsters. Of course, he wouldn’t say, but I know he gets scared sometimes, so - well, what else can I do?”
***
Two
“You two seemed very close in there,” said the Doctor, as he hauled Sarah out of the cell she’d been locked in with Harry.
Sarah looked at him.
“Well?”
“Doctor,” she said. “It was two feet square!”
“Excuses,” he said loftily. “There was no need to be hanging on to him quite like that when I opened the door. Not that I mind, but he is a blockhead, you know.”
Sarah glared at him. “I was cold,” she said with dignity and walked on past him.
***
Three
The Doctor entered the console room in time to see Sarah push Harry away hastily.
He sulked into his scarf.
“I say,” said Harry, looking slightly startled at his unexpectedly rough treatment. “Steady on, old girl.”
Sarah turned her head from one to the other. “Didn’t you two see it?”
“See what?”
“Oh,” she said, “a horrible thing. With antlers - and - great big fangs - right over there!” She mimed with her hands, bringing her rapid invention to life.
Harry surveyed her with a furrowed brow. “You sure you’re feeling all right, old thing? First you push me for no reason, and now you’re hallucinating.”
“Some malevolent force has invaded the TARDIS?” said the Doctor. “Come with me immediately, Sarah!”
Harry put his hands in his jacket pockets and shrugged. “I think you’d be better off taking her temperature.”
“Hah,” said the Doctor. “I suppose you mean you’d be better off taking her temperature - holding her hand and smoothing her fevered brow, eh?”
He scratched his head. “Doctor, I hate to say this, but it sounds as though you’ve both gone down with something.”
***
Four
“I was feeling chilly and I thought I’d borrow Harry’s jacket.”
The Doctor strode in through the entrance to Harry’s room and walked round her, as if to check she was real. “You did? Sarah, I don’t think you’d suit that duffel coat.”
“No, his jacket,” she said, her tongue in her cheek.
“Well, that’s no better!”
Harry wondered back into his room to find he had gathered a crowd. “Oh, hallo. Come for that book, have you, old thing?”
“And your jacket,” added Sarah.
He glanced down and gave a slight sigh. “Er. Yes. Sarah, what would you want with my jacket?”
“That’s what I said,” put in the Doctor. “It’s the most preposterous thing I ever heard. It’s not even cold in here!”
Harry stared upwards this time. “Well, what else would Sarah be doing in my room?”
“Oh, all right,” said Sarah, before the Doctor exploded. “I didn’t want to make Harry nervous again, but you remember those Cybermat things…?”
*
Two hours later:
“I think,” said Harry, sounding resigned, “that Sarah must have been imagining things again.”
Sarah looked around at the mess they had made. “Sorry. Maybe it was only a trick of the light.”
“And,” added Harry, “what do you mean, make me nervous again?”
***
Five
“Sarah,” said Harry. “I understand that you wanted to teach the Doctor a lesson, but don’t you think it would be much easier to tell him the truth?”
She looked up from her notebook. “Spoilsport.”
“Well, it’s not your room he keeps wrecking, looking for non-existent alien parasites, and it isn’t you he keeps calling an imbecile every other minute,” he pointed out mildly.
She sighed. “Oh, I suppose so. You mean, come clean and admit there’s nothing going on?”
“Well, it might be a good idea, old girl,” he said. Then he looked at her. “Nothing? There was all that hand-holding.”
“Oh, don’t you start! I don’t see why I should tell him. If he wants to leap to conclusions like that, it serves him right.”
Harry moved over. “Sarah,” he said, “much as I hate to let you down, if you won’t tell him that there’s nothing going on between us, then there’s only one other course of action that would simplify matters.”
“Well,” said Sarah, after a pause, looking up at him from beneath her eyelashes. “That took you long enough, Harry Sullivan!”
*
“I knew it!” said the Doctor, when he entered to find them kissing. “I hate to boast, but I am something of a genius and I’m rarely wrong about these things.”
Harry shook his head. “I’m afraid you are, Doctor. Tell him, Sarah.”
“You see,” she explained, taking the Doctor’s arm, “there’s absolutely nothing going on between us, honest.”
“Nothing at all,” agreed Harry. “If you don’t count the hand-holding.”
Sarah elbowed him. “That was only because you were scared.”
“It was? Was it? I say,” he said. “I must have been petrified just then. Probably saw a terrible thing in the TARDIS - antlers and big claws, eh?”
“Fangs,” she said, nodding. “What else could I do?”
The Doctor glared at them both. “I’m setting the co-ordinates for Earth. The Brigadier’s been calling on that wretched thing for weeks now and I can see it’s time I got you both home.”
“Whoops,” said Sarah.
Harry shrugged.
“You know,” Said Sarah demurely, “I think we should go and find your coat, after all.”
He opened the inner door for her. “Whatever you say, Miss Smith.”
*
There were times, thought the Doctor, as he indulged in a sulk of satisfyingly epic proportions, even if no one was there to witness it, when he didn’t understand humans at all.
He still didn’t see why she wouldn’t rather hold his hand.
***