Title: The (Official) TARDIS Souvenir
Warnings: None
Rating: PG
Pairings/Characters: The Doctor (11), Melody Pond, Sarah Jane, Martha Jones, Mickey Smith, Jack Harkness, Face of Boe, The Doctor (10), Susan Foreman
Word Count: 1067
Author's Note: Written in response to
this prompt for Free-For-All Friday at
comment_fic Summary: Exposure to the Time Vortex during her conception resulted in Melody Pond becoming half Time Lord. This only serves to give the TARDIS ideas...
The first time it was discovered, young Melody Pond was revealed to be half Time Lord. She wasn't a full Time Lord, but she had enough properties from being conceived while in flight in the TARDIS to be less than completely human. At the time, it was believed that this had occurred due to the circumstances of her conception--and it was. However, the TARDIS took note of this discovery, and discovered that with a little nudging, being conceived within the Vortex wasn't necessary. As she knows all of space and time, she then decided to fill in the yawning chasm left in the fabric of the universe due to the departure of most of the Time Lords.
However, one problem she encountered was finding suitable potential Time Lords. That was, until she realized that there was an abundance of humans traveling through the Vortex. While she couldn't outright begin the changes to the Doctor's companions while they were traveling with him, she did have the means.
When enemies turn to dust, when a dead man revives, when the bad wolf howls...there is a shift. The universe breathes a sigh of relief, and everything changes.
--
It's a normal morning when she gets up. Sarah Jane stretches, rubbing her head lightly as she pads to the loo. She'd been having a horrible pain in her head lately, but it was gone for the first time in ages. Maybe Luke would finally stop nagging her to go to the hospital to get checked out.
With a yawn, she reaches for her toothbrush and toothpaste. However, halfway through her motion, she pauses. Her skin is as smooth as it used to be when she was twenty. Examining her hands in confusion, she slowly looks up into the mirror. Her reflection stares back. Her blue-eyed, blond haired, young reflection.
She screams.
--
Martha and Mickey run down the halls of the building as it falls around them. They'd been on the trail of something that had been attacking young women and sucking the youth straight out of them. They had finally had it cornered, only for an earthquake of all things to hit. Any other building would have been fine, but they were in the most decrepit building in town, and it was definitely far below safety code regulations.
Martha screams as she narrowly avoids a falling beam, only to suddenly fall through the floor.
Mickey turns around in alarm.
"Martha? Martha!"
The building gives one last shudder, and falls to the ground.
Somewhere beneath the rubble, two golden lights glow. Then the remains of the building begin to shift, and two strangers crawl out. They stare at each other in amazement, before Mickey cradles his face in his hands.
"I didn't sign up to be a bloody Time Lord!"
--
Jack has been alive for so many years, that he no longer knows how long it's been. He knows he was born in the 51st century, that his true name is not Jack, that he knew a man called the Doctor, and that he cannot die.
So, the day that he stares down at the tentacle impaling his chest, golden light glowing from his extremities, he knows something is not right. He's probably died more times than years he's lived, and it's always, always, always darkness.
But...when the light recedes, and Jack discovers an inability to turn his head and tentacles in the place of a body, he can't bring himself to feel surprised.
First things first, he needs to find a jar...
--
The Face of Boe dies an honorable death. It's not the first time he's died, but it's certainly the first time he's died in this body.
When the Doctor and Martha walk away, while their backs are turned, the large head glows with a golden light.
When the room is finally dark again, the newly regenerated man hops to his feet and flexes muscles he hasn't used in millennia. He was no longer Jack, he was no longer the Face of Boe--thank goodness, one more year of seeing life through glass and he was going to do something desperate--he was now someone else.
Rose's Bad Wolf revival trick had worn off for good, and had left him a little souvenir, courtesy of the TARDIS. He didn't know that, of course.
--
The Doctor runs. He pretends he isn't running, but he is. He leaves River to take her parents home--and wasn't that unexpected?--and flees to the comfort of the TARDIS and the Vortex.
He pets the TARDIS console gently. "Hey, Sexy! What do you say to checking out the creches of Zarmengania? No, not the creches, probably best to avoid babies for now. Oooh! What about the Mall of Orion? I could use--"
His rambling is interrupted by the ringing of a cell phone. Frowning, he paws around the console, looking for the missing item. He can't find it.
It rings incessantly, before stopping. It then starts up again.
The Doctor continues to search.
He finally finds it jammed in a random vent, somewhere behind the coat rack. It’s still ringing.
As he moves to answer it, his pocket begins to buzz. He pulls out the psychic paper. Then, his TARDIS phone begins to ring. And then his spare psychic paper in his other pocket begins to vibrate.
Then, someone knocks on his TARDIS door, which is parked--he quickly checks the screen--in 3059 Earth. He didn't know anyone from then, did he? Was he going to?
The knocking stops, and he relaxes, moving to answer the cell phone while bringing the psychic paper up to look at it.
Donna starts screaming in his ear while the Doctor stares in disbelief at many tiny messages crammed onto the surface of his psychic paper, including one that looks to be made primarily of expletives (he's not quite sure who it's from) and one from Jack claiming that the dying thing's been fixed, but now he's regenerating, and what are the chances of him regenerating into a large nigh-immortal head again?
Then, the TARDIS door opens, and the Doctor looks up in surprise.
"Grandfather, what in the name of Rassilon is going on?!"
--
If she could have, the TARDIS would have smiled. The songs of the Time Lords had returned. Now, to figure out how to fix the TARDIS problem...