Countdown to Martha: Together, On This Same Earth (Martha/Victoria)
Title: Together, On This Same Earth
Author: biichan
Rating: Hard R
Characters/Pairings: Martha/Victoria, Tenth Doctor, Polly, Barbara, Ian, Jamie
Spoilers: Mostly just for B&W Who.
Disclaimer: Doctor Who is not mine. (If it were mine, the Doctor and Jamie would have snogged. So would the Doctor and Romana.)
Summary: Once you've started traveling in time and space, things are never quite the same when you stop.
Author’s notes: Victoria's interest in Eastern philosophy is a reference to Downtime. Thank you to midnightlurker for the beta and doyle_sb4 and spiralsheep for their advice.
The problem with living for a year in a box that travels through time and space is that it's quite easy to quickly become accustomed to books that have not been written, songs that have not been sung. After Victoria left the TARDIS she tried to find the ones that she particularly missed. The results, sadly to say, were mixed.
She found the ballet books by Miss Estoril, but not the ones by Miss Ariyoshi; the fantastic tales of Mr Lewis, Miss Nesbit and Mr Eager, but not Miss Cooper or Miss Duane-there were albums by Miss Baez and Miss King on the shelf of the record shop she worked in after moving to London, but not ones by Miss Bush or Miss Hawkins. Victoria was uncertain of the future of Los Angeles: Miss Block had described it in such magical detail, but Mr Pinkwater had been quite adamant about its nonexistence (and neither writer was around yet to question.) She bit the inside of her cheek when John married Yoko and tried not to think of how a man with a cat's head had told her that he was going be shot.
Victoria took very little with her from the TARDIS: a few dresses appropriate for the time period, a pair of Edwardian suits in case she ever needed to run around in trousers, her sewing basket, and three photographs. The first was of Jamie and the Doctor, arms around each other as they looked up into each other's beaming faces. The second had been taken on the same day by Anne Travers and was the Doctor and Jamie again, only this time with Victoria in the shelter of their arms. The third, which she felt vaguely guilty about, was of a pretty girl her own age, with a dark brown cap of hair and a mysterious smile. She didn't know who the girl was, though she suspected that it might be the Doctor's mysterious granddaughter, whose room she'd once slept in. She took the pictures out whenever she felt particularly sad or lonely.
This isn't to say that Victoria was unhappy in the future world of 1969, for she had a home and plenty of food to eat, friends in the form of the Harrises (who she knew she could call if she ever needed to) and lived in a world where a girl could choose whether or not she wanted to get married or have a career or go to India or Tibet and study at the feet of the Eastern Masters. But when you've had all of time and space open to you, it's quite an odd sensation to be confined to one planet, one year at a time. It was a relief not to always be running from monsters, but the feeling of being unstuck in time (as one of the books not yet written called it) never really left Victoria.
She thought, perhaps, Martha felt it too.
Martha was the Colored woman (not much older than a girl, really) that Mr Bernard had hired after Annie had left to have her baby. She was quick on her feet and far more clever than most of their customers gave her credit for. She lived in Hackney, boarding in the spare room of a married couple she said a friend had introduced her to, and took the Tube to work. Martha opened the store in the morning and Victoria closed it down at night. They spent the midday hours that their shifts overlapped in easy camaraderie, talking of things like Shakespeare and salamanders, Buddha and Bagism.
One day Martha caught Victoria singing to herself as she dusted the record bins: Heathcliffe, it's me, I'm Cathy, I've come home. Open up your window...
“Victoria,” she said very quietly. Martha never called her Vic or Vicky-it was one of the reasons Victoria had grown so fond of her in the month since they'd started working together. “Victoria, if I asked if you were born in the future, would you think I was mad?”
Victoria blinked. “No,” she whispered back, “but I wasn't.” She glanced to make sure Mr Bernard wasn't listening to them. “I was born,” she confided, “more than a hundred years ago.”
Martha nodded solemnly. “There was an angel-a statue of an angel-wasn't there?”
“No,” said Victoria, “a man in a a blue-”
The store bell tinkled. “You have a customer, girls,” Mr Bernard observed in his usual lugubrious tones. Angels and men in boxes were forgotten as they both rushed to the front.
***
Martha was still there when Victoria finished closing the store. She'd changed into denim trousers somewhere along the line and pulled her hair back. “It was a man in a blue box,” said Martha, “wasn't it?”
“And a boy. His name was Jamie.” Victoria bit her lip. “Do you want to come over to my flat? I could make us tea. I think perhaps we should talk.”
Martha nodded. “So do I.”
Victoria put Chelsea Girl on the phonograph when they got to her flat. She filled the kettle while Nico sang about leaving in the fairest of the seasons and set it to boil, then went to sit down next to Martha. Her hands were shaking, just a little.
“My father,” she said, “was a scientist, an inventor. He worked for a man named Maxtible. They made a cabinet together, lined with mirrors, and monsters came out of it. They were horrible things in rolling cases shaped like pepper pots.”
“Daleks,” said Martha softly.
Victoria nodded. “Daleks,” she confirmed. “They... they took me prisoner, so that my father would obey them. They wanted him to find a man named the Doctor...”
Martha squeezed her hand when she'd finished her story. “It's all right now, Victoria. You're here. The Daleks aren't.”
“I know,” said Victoria. She looked up at Martha. “You know him too, the Doctor.”
“He was my patient,” said Martha, smiling wryly at the surprised expression on Victoria's face. “I was studying to be a doctor myself, back in 2007. He'd disguised himself as one of the patients our class visited. Then these alien rhinoceroses-don't laugh, they really were-transported our entire hospital to the moon...”
“Is he with you then?” Victoria asked at the end of Martha's story. Her stomach felt as if a dozen butterflies were beating their wings within. “Is Jamie...”
Martha squeezed her hand again. “Oh Victoria,” she whispered. “I never had a chance to meet him.”
***
They talked through the night and well into the early morning, but the next day was Sunday and the shop wasn't open. Martha said she wasn't really one for church anymore and Victoria confessed, shyly, that she was the same way now. It was traveling with the Doctor that had done it, she'd explained. You couldn't think of things the same way after it. Martha nodded along as if she knew just what Victoria meant.
It was strange, Victoria thought, but if she were a boy, she thought she'd have wanted to kiss Martha.
There was room enough in Victoria's bed for two, if they didn't mind squeezing a bit. Victoria lay awake listening to Martha breathing. She didn't remember when she'd finally fallen asleep, only that when she'd awoke Martha was there with toasted bread and marmalade and a smile on her face.
“It's all right,” she said. “I called Barbara and Ian and told them where I'd been. We're all meeting in the park today for a picnic and we want you to come too.”
***
“I don't understand,” Victoria whispered underneath her breath as Martha led her toward the group sitting under the tree. There was a woman, two men, a baby, and a blond girl hardly older than Victoria. “Who are all these people?”
“You'll see,” Martha said serenely, tugging her closer.
One of the men-the one in the long coat, with the improbable hair sticking up in brown spikes-startled. “Victoria?” He'd sprung to his feet in a burst of energy, was bounding toward her with an amazed expression on his face. “Oh my giddy aunt, it really is you!” He wrapped his arms around her, picking her up and spinning her around. “Oh Victoria, it's been so long!”
Victoria gasped. “Doctor?” No, it couldn't be! But somehow, this strange man felt like him.
“Yes, it's me,” said the man. “It's me, the Doctor.”
“But you're so tall,” she said, hardly able to believe it all. “And so young! And your hair-”
“Amazing, isn't it?” he said, setting her back on the ground so that he could pat the spikes proudly. “Just a little bit of gel-or pomade-that's all it takes, really.”
“He changed his appearance,” the blond girl said. “He does that sometimes. Don't worry, he's still the Doctor, even if he's even more mad than the last one. I'm Polly, by the way. Ben would have loved to come, but he shipped out again yesterday.”
“And this is Barbara,” the Doctor said, “and Ian. They're married!” he added proudly, as if he considered himself responsible for this event. “And that's little Johnny there-I like to think they named him for me-it's one of my aliases, you know: John Smith.”
“We've all traveled with the Doctor,” Martha explained. “Every one of us here. Well, except for Johnny. Probably.”
Victoria blinked. “All of you?”
“There's more of us,” said Polly, “but the Doctor says they mostly haven't met him yet.”
Victoria bit her lip. “What about Jamie?”
The Doctor got very quiet all of a sudden. “You have to understand,” he said finally, “that it's been much longer for me than it has for you. Centuries. I'm more than twice the age I was when you knew me.”
Victoria didn't breathe for a long moment. “He's dead, isn't he?”
“For a very long time now,” said the Doctor. “I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.”
“Did he die well?” Victoria heard herself asking.
The Doctor smiled sadly. “Oh Victoria,” he said softly. “He died very well indeed.”
***
Things were different after that. Victoria had someone to share her secrets with, other people who'd been through space and time. Barbara and Ian were quite kind to her, the way Ruth had been when she and her father had first come to live with the Maxtibles, so very long ago. Polly was sophisticated and daring-she promised Victoria and Martha that she'd take them out dancing and when the club she picked wouldn't let Martha in, she told the owner that she certainly wouldn't be coming back. Victoria thought Polly really meant it, too.
Instead, the three of them trooped back to Victoria's flat (taking care to avoid the landlord, who didn't quite trust Martha) and piled onto her couch. “It's too bad you don't have a television,” Polly said, yawning lazily. “I heard they were going to air that movie they made from Barbara's book.”
“What movie?” Victoria asked. She hadn't even realized that Barbara had written one.
“You know,” said Polly airily. “Doctor Who. With Peter Cushing.”
Victoria blinked furiously. “That was Barbara?”
“I knew it,” said Martha. “I knew I'd seen something like the TARDIS when I was a kid. I just couldn't remember where!”
“Well, of course you'd have seen something like the TARDIS,” said Polly. “It's only a police box, after all.”
“They don't have those in the future,” said Martha. “Not anymore. Not like the TARDIS. In twenty-three years I'd seen a handful of them at the most and they were either red or the wrong shape altogether.”
Polly shrugged. “Do you think he built it, like in the movie?”
“I don't know!” said Martha. “When I tried to ask, he got a furtive look and mumbled something about borrowing it for a while.”
Victoria, however, was distracted by more important things. “How on earth is Peter Cushing supposed to be the Doctor? Why, he looks nothing like him! Either of him!”
“Any of him,” agreed Polly. “And especially not the one he's supposed to be.”
“What did your Doctors look like?” Martha asked curiously.
“An old man,” said Polly. “With long white hair-well, longer back then, anyhow-and a hooting laugh. He used to get his words mixed up, sometimes, but he was quite brave. After the mess with the Cybermen, he changed his appearance and became a younger, shorter, sillier man, with hair like a Beatle.”
“Mine was a funny little man with a recorder,” said Victoria shyly. “I suppose he must have been Polly's other one?” Polly nodded. “Well, he was very kind and also very brave, although he didn't always seem that way. He and Jamie used to grab onto each other whenever something startled them.”
Polly laughed. “Oh, that sounds like them.” She tilted her head slightly, looking thoughtfully at Victoria. “You never did tell us just what was between you and Jamie.”
“I loved him,” Victoria said, blushing. “He and the Doctor... they were like a pair of older brothers and they took care of me, like I was the most precious thing they had. They were family to me. After Father and Kemel died on the Dalek planet, they were the only people I had left.”
Polly raised an eyebrow. “Kemel?”
“He was a Turkish wrestler,” said Victoria. “Mr Maxtible's servant. He... he was sweet on me. He used to bring me flowers. I was fond of him.” She closed her eyes, remembering his smile and his bright eyes and the secret thoughts she'd once had of him, the ones she'd never told anyone, not the Doctor and especially not Jamie, who might have been jealous. She tried not to think of Maxtible's voice-made inhuman by the Dalek arch-shouting “kill, kill, kill” as he pushed Kemel to his death.
Martha squeezed her hand. “I'm going to make us more tea,” she said softly.
“It's funny,” Polly whispered, while Martha filled the kettle, “but if I'd never traveled with the Doctor, I'd never met Martha. I don't think I'd have even said hello to her if I passed her in the street. But she's a lovely person. Do you think that in the future, everyone is more equal? Men and women, people from every country and of every color?”
Victoria bit her lip, remembering Toberman, who'd given his life to save people who cared little for him. “I think,” she murmured, “it depends which part of the future you're in.”
***
Polly left just before midnight but Martha stayed. She had her hair down. It suited her. It was a warm night and she'd taken off her jacket. The sleeves on her dress were short enough to be barely there at all and Victoria could see the outline of her butterfly tattoo. “Can I touch it?” she whispered.
Martha nodded. Victoria gently traced the line of its tail. “I got it on my twentieth birthday,” Martha said softly. “Tish-my sister, Leticia-and my cousin Adeola-they took me out to get it, said they'd pay for whatever I wanted. Mum was absolutely furious when she found out.”
“You must miss it dreadfully,” Victoria whispered. “The future, I mean.”
Martha nodded. “I do. 1969's better than 1913, though. No matter how stupidly racist or sexist people get here, I know it can be worse.” She shook her head. “There's even some things about 1969 that are better than where I come from. People still believe they can change the world. They don't anymore, when I come from. Not anymore. There's so much more hope here.”
“When I was a little girl,” said Victoria, “I was an awful tomboy. I climbed trees and rode horses and pestered Father into teaching me how to shoot a gun. He thought it was because I never really knew my mother. When I was thirteen and we came to live with the Maxtibles, Ruth took me under her wing. She taught me how to embroider, how to choose my clothes for each occasion, how to run a household. Everything I would need to know to be a good wife.” Victoria took a deep breath. “I don't need to know those things here. I don't have to be a wife, not if I don't want to. I can be nearly anything I want to be. I could go to university, take a degree. I could go to India and live in an ashram. It won't be easy, because I am a girl, but I have the choice.”
Martha took her hand. “What do you want to do, Victoria?”
“I want to study,” Victoria said, readily. “Anything. Everything. Eastern philosophy, most of all. I want to learn how to meditate. I went to Tibet with the Doctor and Jamie-we met these monks-there were Yeti-I was frighten, but I was so fascinated-and more than anything, I want to learn the things the monks knew.”
“Then you should,” Martha whispered. “When we get the TARDIS back, the Doctor and I can take you to Tibet.”
He'd probably get lost along the way, Victoria thought. There'd be monsters. She looked up into Martha's eyes, so kind and inviting. “And this,” she murmured, “I want to do this.” And summoning up every small bit of courage she had in her body, Victoria leaned over and kissed Martha.
***
Victoria wasn't sure how they made it back to her bed, they were kissing so much. Their dresses lay tangled together on the floor, their shoes kicked to the far side of the room. Martha's hair smelled like oranges-her mouth was warm-her hands were gentle even as they were rough from months of scrubbing floors. “You're so lovely,” Victoria whispered.
“Oh, Victoria,” Martha murmured. “So are you.” She twisted her fingers in Victoria's hair and sighed.
“I've never done this,” Victoria whispered, pressing her face against Martha's shoulder. “Not ever, not with anyone.”
“Do you want to know a secret?” Martha whispered back. “Neither have I. I came close once at a party Tish dragged me to, but it didn't happen. I was always too busy studying to be with anyone, boy or girl. And then I ran off with the Doctor, but he's too much in love with the ghost of Rose to ever really look at me.”
Victoria looked up. “Who's Rose?”
“A girl he knew,” said Martha. “She doesn't matter.”
“Of course,” Victoria said, bewildered. “Why should she?”
“I don't know,” said Martha and she kissed Victoria deeply. Her hand slipped between them, to the place between Victoria's legs.
Victoria whimpered.
Martha laughed and she started kissing Victoria's throat and then downward, taking great care with the tips of both breasts. Her nimble fingers quickly worked out a way to make Victoria gasp.
“I thought you hadn't done this before,” Victoria said plaintively.
Martha grinned at her. “That doesn't mean I didn't read books.”
***
No one noticed that something had changed between her and Martha, that something wonderful had happened. Not even the Doctor noticed, though she rather thought he ought to have. Mr Bernard was the same every day: same long beard trying to make up for his bare head, still prophesying ruination and bankruptcy at the close of every evening as Victoria worked furiously to balance the cash drawer.
Nobody noticed it and yet it was there in every smile they shared, every word they spoke. It was there in their clasped hands as they watched the moon landing on the Chestertons' fuzzy black and white telly, in Victoria's smile as Martha mouthed Neil Armstrong's words: “One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”
“Did I ever take you to the moon?” the Doctor asked her after it was done. They'd managed to get him to quiet down for the moon-landing, but he wasn't one to remain silenced for long. “I know I took Jamie, more than once-there were Cybermen, that one time, I was always running into them, and Ice Warriors the other-but did I take you?”
Victoria shook her head. “You never took us, either,” said Ian. “I suppose you might have tried, but you never could steer the TARDIS.”
“Well,” said the Doctor, “I suppose I'll have to, once we get the TARDIS back.”
Victoria bit her lip. It was probably horrible of her, wasn't it, that she hoped they never would.
***
The Cybermen invaded that summer. The Doctor had been prepared for it. He'd smashed Polly's super-transistor, which had been made by International Electromatic, and they'd all kept their heads down as the Cybermen marched though London. “Shouldn't we be doing something?” Martha hissed.
“I'm already doing something,” the Doctor snapped “That's why we're keeping out of it, so we don't mess with the past.”
“Just tell me they'll be gone soon,” Victoria said, her voice tight with fear. “Please.”
***
She visited Jamie in the hospital. The Doctor told her where he was and it only made sense to. She didn't know when she'd see him again, if he'd ever come back to Earth while she was still living.
“Victoria?” There was no disguising the happiness in his voice. “How did you get here?”
“The Doctor told me you were here,” Victoria said. “He remembered. Are you quite all right?”
Jamie looked down. “Aye, this? They shot me in the leg and it hurts more than anything, but I'll be all right. They've got good doctors here in the future-real ones, not the sorry excuses they had back in my day. I'll keep my leg.”
“Oh Jamie,” she murmured, taking his hand.
“What about you?” he asked. “Are you happy here in the future, Victoria?”
“You know,” she said softly, “I think I am.”
***
Victoria knew the Doctor had found his TARDIS when Martha didn't show up for work. She found it just inside the door to her flat. Martha was there, sitting on the bed. “We're going,” she said softly.
“I know,” said Victoria.
“You could come with us,” said Martha. “You could visit the moon. We could go to Tibet. I'd keep you safe from the monsters.”
Victoria shook her head. She wasn't going to cry, no matter how much she wanted to. “I can't. Martha, you know I can't.”
Martha nodded slowly. “I'll look for you then,” she whispered, standing up and taking Victoria's hands. “In the future.”
“I'll be so old,” Victoria whispered back.
“So what?” said Martha. “The Doctor's nine-hundred.” Victoria laughed then, in spite of herself, and Martha kissed her. “Take pictures of Tibet for me,” she whispered, “when you go.”
“I promise,” Victoria whispered back. She was crying after all.“Oh Martha, I won't forget you.”
“Don't worry,” Martha said, her eyes wet as she hugged Victoria tight to her. “I won't forget you either.”
The world seemed smaller with Martha gone, emptier. Victoria hugged her pillow to her chest. “Now stop that,” she told herself. “She'll be back. She's vanished now, but she'll be born eventually and you'll get to meet her again in this lifetime. And you don't want to tell her that in forty years you never did anything, did you?”
There were things for her to learn-there was Tibet-there were books to read and songs to sing along to. Forty years would feel like nothing at all.
Author: biichan
Rating: Hard R
Characters/Pairings: Martha/Victoria, Tenth Doctor, Polly, Barbara, Ian, Jamie
Spoilers: Mostly just for B&W Who.
Disclaimer: Doctor Who is not mine. (If it were mine, the Doctor and Jamie would have snogged. So would the Doctor and Romana.)
Summary: Once you've started traveling in time and space, things are never quite the same when you stop.
Author’s notes: Victoria's interest in Eastern philosophy is a reference to Downtime. Thank you to midnightlurker for the beta and doyle_sb4 and spiralsheep for their advice.
The problem with living for a year in a box that travels through time and space is that it's quite easy to quickly become accustomed to books that have not been written, songs that have not been sung. After Victoria left the TARDIS she tried to find the ones that she particularly missed. The results, sadly to say, were mixed.
She found the ballet books by Miss Estoril, but not the ones by Miss Ariyoshi; the fantastic tales of Mr Lewis, Miss Nesbit and Mr Eager, but not Miss Cooper or Miss Duane-there were albums by Miss Baez and Miss King on the shelf of the record shop she worked in after moving to London, but not ones by Miss Bush or Miss Hawkins. Victoria was uncertain of the future of Los Angeles: Miss Block had described it in such magical detail, but Mr Pinkwater had been quite adamant about its nonexistence (and neither writer was around yet to question.) She bit the inside of her cheek when John married Yoko and tried not to think of how a man with a cat's head had told her that he was going be shot.
Victoria took very little with her from the TARDIS: a few dresses appropriate for the time period, a pair of Edwardian suits in case she ever needed to run around in trousers, her sewing basket, and three photographs. The first was of Jamie and the Doctor, arms around each other as they looked up into each other's beaming faces. The second had been taken on the same day by Anne Travers and was the Doctor and Jamie again, only this time with Victoria in the shelter of their arms. The third, which she felt vaguely guilty about, was of a pretty girl her own age, with a dark brown cap of hair and a mysterious smile. She didn't know who the girl was, though she suspected that it might be the Doctor's mysterious granddaughter, whose room she'd once slept in. She took the pictures out whenever she felt particularly sad or lonely.
This isn't to say that Victoria was unhappy in the future world of 1969, for she had a home and plenty of food to eat, friends in the form of the Harrises (who she knew she could call if she ever needed to) and lived in a world where a girl could choose whether or not she wanted to get married or have a career or go to India or Tibet and study at the feet of the Eastern Masters. But when you've had all of time and space open to you, it's quite an odd sensation to be confined to one planet, one year at a time. It was a relief not to always be running from monsters, but the feeling of being unstuck in time (as one of the books not yet written called it) never really left Victoria.
She thought, perhaps, Martha felt it too.
Martha was the Colored woman (not much older than a girl, really) that Mr Bernard had hired after Annie had left to have her baby. She was quick on her feet and far more clever than most of their customers gave her credit for. She lived in Hackney, boarding in the spare room of a married couple she said a friend had introduced her to, and took the Tube to work. Martha opened the store in the morning and Victoria closed it down at night. They spent the midday hours that their shifts overlapped in easy camaraderie, talking of things like Shakespeare and salamanders, Buddha and Bagism.
One day Martha caught Victoria singing to herself as she dusted the record bins: Heathcliffe, it's me, I'm Cathy, I've come home. Open up your window...
“Victoria,” she said very quietly. Martha never called her Vic or Vicky-it was one of the reasons Victoria had grown so fond of her in the month since they'd started working together. “Victoria, if I asked if you were born in the future, would you think I was mad?”
Victoria blinked. “No,” she whispered back, “but I wasn't.” She glanced to make sure Mr Bernard wasn't listening to them. “I was born,” she confided, “more than a hundred years ago.”
Martha nodded solemnly. “There was an angel-a statue of an angel-wasn't there?”
“No,” said Victoria, “a man in a a blue-”
The store bell tinkled. “You have a customer, girls,” Mr Bernard observed in his usual lugubrious tones. Angels and men in boxes were forgotten as they both rushed to the front.
***
Martha was still there when Victoria finished closing the store. She'd changed into denim trousers somewhere along the line and pulled her hair back. “It was a man in a blue box,” said Martha, “wasn't it?”
“And a boy. His name was Jamie.” Victoria bit her lip. “Do you want to come over to my flat? I could make us tea. I think perhaps we should talk.”
Martha nodded. “So do I.”
Victoria put Chelsea Girl on the phonograph when they got to her flat. She filled the kettle while Nico sang about leaving in the fairest of the seasons and set it to boil, then went to sit down next to Martha. Her hands were shaking, just a little.
“My father,” she said, “was a scientist, an inventor. He worked for a man named Maxtible. They made a cabinet together, lined with mirrors, and monsters came out of it. They were horrible things in rolling cases shaped like pepper pots.”
“Daleks,” said Martha softly.
Victoria nodded. “Daleks,” she confirmed. “They... they took me prisoner, so that my father would obey them. They wanted him to find a man named the Doctor...”
Martha squeezed her hand when she'd finished her story. “It's all right now, Victoria. You're here. The Daleks aren't.”
“I know,” said Victoria. She looked up at Martha. “You know him too, the Doctor.”
“He was my patient,” said Martha, smiling wryly at the surprised expression on Victoria's face. “I was studying to be a doctor myself, back in 2007. He'd disguised himself as one of the patients our class visited. Then these alien rhinoceroses-don't laugh, they really were-transported our entire hospital to the moon...”
“Is he with you then?” Victoria asked at the end of Martha's story. Her stomach felt as if a dozen butterflies were beating their wings within. “Is Jamie...”
Martha squeezed her hand again. “Oh Victoria,” she whispered. “I never had a chance to meet him.”
***
They talked through the night and well into the early morning, but the next day was Sunday and the shop wasn't open. Martha said she wasn't really one for church anymore and Victoria confessed, shyly, that she was the same way now. It was traveling with the Doctor that had done it, she'd explained. You couldn't think of things the same way after it. Martha nodded along as if she knew just what Victoria meant.
It was strange, Victoria thought, but if she were a boy, she thought she'd have wanted to kiss Martha.
There was room enough in Victoria's bed for two, if they didn't mind squeezing a bit. Victoria lay awake listening to Martha breathing. She didn't remember when she'd finally fallen asleep, only that when she'd awoke Martha was there with toasted bread and marmalade and a smile on her face.
“It's all right,” she said. “I called Barbara and Ian and told them where I'd been. We're all meeting in the park today for a picnic and we want you to come too.”
***
“I don't understand,” Victoria whispered underneath her breath as Martha led her toward the group sitting under the tree. There was a woman, two men, a baby, and a blond girl hardly older than Victoria. “Who are all these people?”
“You'll see,” Martha said serenely, tugging her closer.
One of the men-the one in the long coat, with the improbable hair sticking up in brown spikes-startled. “Victoria?” He'd sprung to his feet in a burst of energy, was bounding toward her with an amazed expression on his face. “Oh my giddy aunt, it really is you!” He wrapped his arms around her, picking her up and spinning her around. “Oh Victoria, it's been so long!”
Victoria gasped. “Doctor?” No, it couldn't be! But somehow, this strange man felt like him.
“Yes, it's me,” said the man. “It's me, the Doctor.”
“But you're so tall,” she said, hardly able to believe it all. “And so young! And your hair-”
“Amazing, isn't it?” he said, setting her back on the ground so that he could pat the spikes proudly. “Just a little bit of gel-or pomade-that's all it takes, really.”
“He changed his appearance,” the blond girl said. “He does that sometimes. Don't worry, he's still the Doctor, even if he's even more mad than the last one. I'm Polly, by the way. Ben would have loved to come, but he shipped out again yesterday.”
“And this is Barbara,” the Doctor said, “and Ian. They're married!” he added proudly, as if he considered himself responsible for this event. “And that's little Johnny there-I like to think they named him for me-it's one of my aliases, you know: John Smith.”
“We've all traveled with the Doctor,” Martha explained. “Every one of us here. Well, except for Johnny. Probably.”
Victoria blinked. “All of you?”
“There's more of us,” said Polly, “but the Doctor says they mostly haven't met him yet.”
Victoria bit her lip. “What about Jamie?”
The Doctor got very quiet all of a sudden. “You have to understand,” he said finally, “that it's been much longer for me than it has for you. Centuries. I'm more than twice the age I was when you knew me.”
Victoria didn't breathe for a long moment. “He's dead, isn't he?”
“For a very long time now,” said the Doctor. “I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.”
“Did he die well?” Victoria heard herself asking.
The Doctor smiled sadly. “Oh Victoria,” he said softly. “He died very well indeed.”
***
Things were different after that. Victoria had someone to share her secrets with, other people who'd been through space and time. Barbara and Ian were quite kind to her, the way Ruth had been when she and her father had first come to live with the Maxtibles, so very long ago. Polly was sophisticated and daring-she promised Victoria and Martha that she'd take them out dancing and when the club she picked wouldn't let Martha in, she told the owner that she certainly wouldn't be coming back. Victoria thought Polly really meant it, too.
Instead, the three of them trooped back to Victoria's flat (taking care to avoid the landlord, who didn't quite trust Martha) and piled onto her couch. “It's too bad you don't have a television,” Polly said, yawning lazily. “I heard they were going to air that movie they made from Barbara's book.”
“What movie?” Victoria asked. She hadn't even realized that Barbara had written one.
“You know,” said Polly airily. “Doctor Who. With Peter Cushing.”
Victoria blinked furiously. “That was Barbara?”
“I knew it,” said Martha. “I knew I'd seen something like the TARDIS when I was a kid. I just couldn't remember where!”
“Well, of course you'd have seen something like the TARDIS,” said Polly. “It's only a police box, after all.”
“They don't have those in the future,” said Martha. “Not anymore. Not like the TARDIS. In twenty-three years I'd seen a handful of them at the most and they were either red or the wrong shape altogether.”
Polly shrugged. “Do you think he built it, like in the movie?”
“I don't know!” said Martha. “When I tried to ask, he got a furtive look and mumbled something about borrowing it for a while.”
Victoria, however, was distracted by more important things. “How on earth is Peter Cushing supposed to be the Doctor? Why, he looks nothing like him! Either of him!”
“Any of him,” agreed Polly. “And especially not the one he's supposed to be.”
“What did your Doctors look like?” Martha asked curiously.
“An old man,” said Polly. “With long white hair-well, longer back then, anyhow-and a hooting laugh. He used to get his words mixed up, sometimes, but he was quite brave. After the mess with the Cybermen, he changed his appearance and became a younger, shorter, sillier man, with hair like a Beatle.”
“Mine was a funny little man with a recorder,” said Victoria shyly. “I suppose he must have been Polly's other one?” Polly nodded. “Well, he was very kind and also very brave, although he didn't always seem that way. He and Jamie used to grab onto each other whenever something startled them.”
Polly laughed. “Oh, that sounds like them.” She tilted her head slightly, looking thoughtfully at Victoria. “You never did tell us just what was between you and Jamie.”
“I loved him,” Victoria said, blushing. “He and the Doctor... they were like a pair of older brothers and they took care of me, like I was the most precious thing they had. They were family to me. After Father and Kemel died on the Dalek planet, they were the only people I had left.”
Polly raised an eyebrow. “Kemel?”
“He was a Turkish wrestler,” said Victoria. “Mr Maxtible's servant. He... he was sweet on me. He used to bring me flowers. I was fond of him.” She closed her eyes, remembering his smile and his bright eyes and the secret thoughts she'd once had of him, the ones she'd never told anyone, not the Doctor and especially not Jamie, who might have been jealous. She tried not to think of Maxtible's voice-made inhuman by the Dalek arch-shouting “kill, kill, kill” as he pushed Kemel to his death.
Martha squeezed her hand. “I'm going to make us more tea,” she said softly.
“It's funny,” Polly whispered, while Martha filled the kettle, “but if I'd never traveled with the Doctor, I'd never met Martha. I don't think I'd have even said hello to her if I passed her in the street. But she's a lovely person. Do you think that in the future, everyone is more equal? Men and women, people from every country and of every color?”
Victoria bit her lip, remembering Toberman, who'd given his life to save people who cared little for him. “I think,” she murmured, “it depends which part of the future you're in.”
***
Polly left just before midnight but Martha stayed. She had her hair down. It suited her. It was a warm night and she'd taken off her jacket. The sleeves on her dress were short enough to be barely there at all and Victoria could see the outline of her butterfly tattoo. “Can I touch it?” she whispered.
Martha nodded. Victoria gently traced the line of its tail. “I got it on my twentieth birthday,” Martha said softly. “Tish-my sister, Leticia-and my cousin Adeola-they took me out to get it, said they'd pay for whatever I wanted. Mum was absolutely furious when she found out.”
“You must miss it dreadfully,” Victoria whispered. “The future, I mean.”
Martha nodded. “I do. 1969's better than 1913, though. No matter how stupidly racist or sexist people get here, I know it can be worse.” She shook her head. “There's even some things about 1969 that are better than where I come from. People still believe they can change the world. They don't anymore, when I come from. Not anymore. There's so much more hope here.”
“When I was a little girl,” said Victoria, “I was an awful tomboy. I climbed trees and rode horses and pestered Father into teaching me how to shoot a gun. He thought it was because I never really knew my mother. When I was thirteen and we came to live with the Maxtibles, Ruth took me under her wing. She taught me how to embroider, how to choose my clothes for each occasion, how to run a household. Everything I would need to know to be a good wife.” Victoria took a deep breath. “I don't need to know those things here. I don't have to be a wife, not if I don't want to. I can be nearly anything I want to be. I could go to university, take a degree. I could go to India and live in an ashram. It won't be easy, because I am a girl, but I have the choice.”
Martha took her hand. “What do you want to do, Victoria?”
“I want to study,” Victoria said, readily. “Anything. Everything. Eastern philosophy, most of all. I want to learn how to meditate. I went to Tibet with the Doctor and Jamie-we met these monks-there were Yeti-I was frighten, but I was so fascinated-and more than anything, I want to learn the things the monks knew.”
“Then you should,” Martha whispered. “When we get the TARDIS back, the Doctor and I can take you to Tibet.”
He'd probably get lost along the way, Victoria thought. There'd be monsters. She looked up into Martha's eyes, so kind and inviting. “And this,” she murmured, “I want to do this.” And summoning up every small bit of courage she had in her body, Victoria leaned over and kissed Martha.
***
Victoria wasn't sure how they made it back to her bed, they were kissing so much. Their dresses lay tangled together on the floor, their shoes kicked to the far side of the room. Martha's hair smelled like oranges-her mouth was warm-her hands were gentle even as they were rough from months of scrubbing floors. “You're so lovely,” Victoria whispered.
“Oh, Victoria,” Martha murmured. “So are you.” She twisted her fingers in Victoria's hair and sighed.
“I've never done this,” Victoria whispered, pressing her face against Martha's shoulder. “Not ever, not with anyone.”
“Do you want to know a secret?” Martha whispered back. “Neither have I. I came close once at a party Tish dragged me to, but it didn't happen. I was always too busy studying to be with anyone, boy or girl. And then I ran off with the Doctor, but he's too much in love with the ghost of Rose to ever really look at me.”
Victoria looked up. “Who's Rose?”
“A girl he knew,” said Martha. “She doesn't matter.”
“Of course,” Victoria said, bewildered. “Why should she?”
“I don't know,” said Martha and she kissed Victoria deeply. Her hand slipped between them, to the place between Victoria's legs.
Victoria whimpered.
Martha laughed and she started kissing Victoria's throat and then downward, taking great care with the tips of both breasts. Her nimble fingers quickly worked out a way to make Victoria gasp.
“I thought you hadn't done this before,” Victoria said plaintively.
Martha grinned at her. “That doesn't mean I didn't read books.”
***
No one noticed that something had changed between her and Martha, that something wonderful had happened. Not even the Doctor noticed, though she rather thought he ought to have. Mr Bernard was the same every day: same long beard trying to make up for his bare head, still prophesying ruination and bankruptcy at the close of every evening as Victoria worked furiously to balance the cash drawer.
Nobody noticed it and yet it was there in every smile they shared, every word they spoke. It was there in their clasped hands as they watched the moon landing on the Chestertons' fuzzy black and white telly, in Victoria's smile as Martha mouthed Neil Armstrong's words: “One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”
“Did I ever take you to the moon?” the Doctor asked her after it was done. They'd managed to get him to quiet down for the moon-landing, but he wasn't one to remain silenced for long. “I know I took Jamie, more than once-there were Cybermen, that one time, I was always running into them, and Ice Warriors the other-but did I take you?”
Victoria shook her head. “You never took us, either,” said Ian. “I suppose you might have tried, but you never could steer the TARDIS.”
“Well,” said the Doctor, “I suppose I'll have to, once we get the TARDIS back.”
Victoria bit her lip. It was probably horrible of her, wasn't it, that she hoped they never would.
***
The Cybermen invaded that summer. The Doctor had been prepared for it. He'd smashed Polly's super-transistor, which had been made by International Electromatic, and they'd all kept their heads down as the Cybermen marched though London. “Shouldn't we be doing something?” Martha hissed.
“I'm already doing something,” the Doctor snapped “That's why we're keeping out of it, so we don't mess with the past.”
“Just tell me they'll be gone soon,” Victoria said, her voice tight with fear. “Please.”
***
She visited Jamie in the hospital. The Doctor told her where he was and it only made sense to. She didn't know when she'd see him again, if he'd ever come back to Earth while she was still living.
“Victoria?” There was no disguising the happiness in his voice. “How did you get here?”
“The Doctor told me you were here,” Victoria said. “He remembered. Are you quite all right?”
Jamie looked down. “Aye, this? They shot me in the leg and it hurts more than anything, but I'll be all right. They've got good doctors here in the future-real ones, not the sorry excuses they had back in my day. I'll keep my leg.”
“Oh Jamie,” she murmured, taking his hand.
“What about you?” he asked. “Are you happy here in the future, Victoria?”
“You know,” she said softly, “I think I am.”
***
Victoria knew the Doctor had found his TARDIS when Martha didn't show up for work. She found it just inside the door to her flat. Martha was there, sitting on the bed. “We're going,” she said softly.
“I know,” said Victoria.
“You could come with us,” said Martha. “You could visit the moon. We could go to Tibet. I'd keep you safe from the monsters.”
Victoria shook her head. She wasn't going to cry, no matter how much she wanted to. “I can't. Martha, you know I can't.”
Martha nodded slowly. “I'll look for you then,” she whispered, standing up and taking Victoria's hands. “In the future.”
“I'll be so old,” Victoria whispered back.
“So what?” said Martha. “The Doctor's nine-hundred.” Victoria laughed then, in spite of herself, and Martha kissed her. “Take pictures of Tibet for me,” she whispered, “when you go.”
“I promise,” Victoria whispered back. She was crying after all.“Oh Martha, I won't forget you.”
“Don't worry,” Martha said, her eyes wet as she hugged Victoria tight to her. “I won't forget you either.”
The world seemed smaller with Martha gone, emptier. Victoria hugged her pillow to her chest. “Now stop that,” she told herself. “She'll be back. She's vanished now, but she'll be born eventually and you'll get to meet her again in this lifetime. And you don't want to tell her that in forty years you never did anything, did you?”
There were things for her to learn-there was Tibet-there were books to read and songs to sing along to. Forty years would feel like nothing at all.