The Doctor arrives
Time: July 24, 2000
Place: Lobby
Status: Public - Complete
Summary: The TARDIS lands
The Doctor didn’t usually sit on the dusty floor of the TARDIS. Usually he would lean against the console, or the wall, or sit on one of the pieces of junk that made do as chairs.
Usually, Rose Tyler would be with him.
But she wasn’t now, and never would be. She was gone. It would have been a bit more bearable if she’d died; at least that had some kind of finality about it, some kind of ending. You couldn’t fight death. It was the end.
(Of course, if he’d been feeling really heroic he could always have done an Orpheus and tried to find the Underworld… he had a fairly good singing voice…)
But this way?
She was in a parallel universe. And if he visited her, he would destroy both worlds.
He hadn’t even gotten the chance to say he loved her…
The Doctor could feel the TARDIS worrying about him. Sentimental thing. She was hovering around the edge of his mind, soft and inquiring, ready with a mental cup of tea. Poor TARDIS. She’d always been there when his other companions left, for one reason or another, but this was quite beyond her. She didn’t quite understand what was going on.
The Doctor sighed. ‘Go away,’ he said softly.
He sounded like a petulant teenager. Ah well.
He kept thinking of the last time he’d seen her. Her fingers slipping on the lever, being dragged into the Vortex, that empty space between worlds (‘some call it Hell’), and him screaming her name… then Pete Tyler, her father, teleporting from his own world to grab her.
Rose, disappearing. Never to be seen again.
He leant his head back against the wall. What was he supposed to do now? Travel, he supposed, as he’d always done. Travel the universe, through time and space, in his little blue box.* Always alone.
He was just considering this when a light on the console began flashing. A screen lit up.
‘Not now,’ he said.
Yes, now, seemed to be the TARDIS’s answer. The light kept flashing incessantly. It seemed she wouldn’t take no for an answer.
Stubborn thing.
He stood up and didn’t even bother to wipe the dust off the back of his long brown trench-coat.** With a sigh, he went over to see what the old girl wanted.
Alone again. Just the Doctor and his box.
He looked at the screen. Then, ‘That’s a bit unusual.’
He might take another companion, but that was a very small likelihood. It would be hard to find someone like Rose.
‘Lower Tadfield? Where’s that? Oh, England. Very unusual.’
Did he even want to find someone like Rose? Would he even be able to stand another companion? Or would he be constantly comparing this new girl to the wonderful Miss Tyler?
‘What year is it? 2000. Turn of the millennium. End of the Spice Girls and rise of S Club. Hmm. What on Earth’s going on there?’
The readings were so strange. Definitely not Earthen, and they were quite unlike any alien thing he’d come across. It could be trouble.
He’d just lost Rose.
They really were very strange…
He stopped and looked at the central column of the TARDIS. It was trying to look innocent.
His face split into a sudden grin. It was one of his wide, worrying ones, that seemed to make his eyes light up with childish glee and made almost everyone in the vicinity back away slowly.
‘Oh, alright,’ he said. He pulled a lever.
And, with his usual tact, the TARDIS - a great big 1960s Police Box - landed in the lobby of Tadfield Manor.
*Which isn’t actually that little. It’s bigger on the inside than the outside. A lot bigger. The inside of the TARDIS was so big the Doctor hadn’t explored all of it. It was entirely likely he had evolving life forms in some of the rooms.
**No, not leather. He’s not that cool.
Place: Lobby
Status: Public - Complete
Summary: The TARDIS lands
The Doctor didn’t usually sit on the dusty floor of the TARDIS. Usually he would lean against the console, or the wall, or sit on one of the pieces of junk that made do as chairs.
Usually, Rose Tyler would be with him.
But she wasn’t now, and never would be. She was gone. It would have been a bit more bearable if she’d died; at least that had some kind of finality about it, some kind of ending. You couldn’t fight death. It was the end.
(Of course, if he’d been feeling really heroic he could always have done an Orpheus and tried to find the Underworld… he had a fairly good singing voice…)
But this way?
She was in a parallel universe. And if he visited her, he would destroy both worlds.
He hadn’t even gotten the chance to say he loved her…
The Doctor could feel the TARDIS worrying about him. Sentimental thing. She was hovering around the edge of his mind, soft and inquiring, ready with a mental cup of tea. Poor TARDIS. She’d always been there when his other companions left, for one reason or another, but this was quite beyond her. She didn’t quite understand what was going on.
The Doctor sighed. ‘Go away,’ he said softly.
He sounded like a petulant teenager. Ah well.
He kept thinking of the last time he’d seen her. Her fingers slipping on the lever, being dragged into the Vortex, that empty space between worlds (‘some call it Hell’), and him screaming her name… then Pete Tyler, her father, teleporting from his own world to grab her.
Rose, disappearing. Never to be seen again.
He leant his head back against the wall. What was he supposed to do now? Travel, he supposed, as he’d always done. Travel the universe, through time and space, in his little blue box.* Always alone.
He was just considering this when a light on the console began flashing. A screen lit up.
‘Not now,’ he said.
Yes, now, seemed to be the TARDIS’s answer. The light kept flashing incessantly. It seemed she wouldn’t take no for an answer.
Stubborn thing.
He stood up and didn’t even bother to wipe the dust off the back of his long brown trench-coat.** With a sigh, he went over to see what the old girl wanted.
Alone again. Just the Doctor and his box.
He looked at the screen. Then, ‘That’s a bit unusual.’
He might take another companion, but that was a very small likelihood. It would be hard to find someone like Rose.
‘Lower Tadfield? Where’s that? Oh, England. Very unusual.’
Did he even want to find someone like Rose? Would he even be able to stand another companion? Or would he be constantly comparing this new girl to the wonderful Miss Tyler?
‘What year is it? 2000. Turn of the millennium. End of the Spice Girls and rise of S Club. Hmm. What on Earth’s going on there?’
The readings were so strange. Definitely not Earthen, and they were quite unlike any alien thing he’d come across. It could be trouble.
He’d just lost Rose.
They really were very strange…
He stopped and looked at the central column of the TARDIS. It was trying to look innocent.
His face split into a sudden grin. It was one of his wide, worrying ones, that seemed to make his eyes light up with childish glee and made almost everyone in the vicinity back away slowly.
‘Oh, alright,’ he said. He pulled a lever.
And, with his usual tact, the TARDIS - a great big 1960s Police Box - landed in the lobby of Tadfield Manor.
*Which isn’t actually that little. It’s bigger on the inside than the outside. A lot bigger. The inside of the TARDIS was so big the Doctor hadn’t explored all of it. It was entirely likely he had evolving life forms in some of the rooms.
**No, not leather. He’s not that cool.