Just a quick oneshot for my best friend, Ali. :)


As I clung to the truss of the old bridge, water lapping at my waist, I berated myself for even getting into this situation. My friends and I were making a film adaptation of The Lady of Shalott and we were doing the famous boat scene today. Since I was such a big fan of the poem, and this had been my idea, they all decided that I should be the title character. So, I got in the boat, in an old-fashioned dress, and pretended to be dead, as my friends cast me out onto the open waters of the lake. As I floated along, I recited words of the poem to myself. Then, I felt water engulfing my hair. The boat had sprung a leak! When I passed under the bridge, I grabbed onto the truss and watched as the boat slowly floated away, sinking by the minute. Now, I'm stuck in the middle of a lake, in a dress that was getting heavier by the minute, with probably no hope of rescue.

I turned to the other side of the lake, and saw a man in a dark blue rowboat make his way over to me. He kept looking over his shoulder, as if to keep tabs as to where I was. Oh, God this was embarrassing! I kept my face to the wooden pole as the man finally came next to me.

"Well," he said, in a British accent, "it looks like someone has been having an adventure."

He looked to be in his late twenties, and his hair was brown and ruffled. He wore a brown trenchcoat with a blue/gray three piece suit underneath with a red tie. He had a huge grin on his face, as if encountering girls hanging onto trusses was normal for him. But he did have a nice smile.

"May I ask, what you are doing here without a boat?"

"... Fishing for lake trout," I firmly replied, even though I didn't know if those were real.

"Lake trout?" he questioned, and I nodded.

"Well, if you're busy, I'll leave you to it. Unless you want a ride to shore?"

"... Yes, please."

It took a lot of effort, but he finally managed to get me into the boat, dress and all.

"Well, if I didn't know any better, I'd think someone was time travelling," he said with a huge smile.

"Can we just, please get to shore?"

"Of course, milady," he said, pretending to tip a hat. "Allon-sy!"

As we got closer to the shore, he said, "What were you really doing there?"

"You'd think I was crazy if I told you."

"Well, I've come across a lot of crazy things, and a girl hanging onto a truss in Elizabethan era clothes is not one of them."

I smiled at what he said, before I said, "Well, my friends and I were filming a scene from The Lady of Shalott-"

"And you are Lady Elaine of Astolat?" he finished.

"Supposed to be, yes."

"Well, you're wearing the wrong dress for starters."

Well, that was a bit rude.

"Elaine never wore that kind of stuff! She prefered white gowns and they were flowing and thin. Not red and gold and velvet," he said, pointed out the flaws between my wardrobe and Elaine's.

"You sound as if you've met her."

"Maybe I did," he said, smiling that big, contagious grin.

"You know something?" he said.

I shrugged, and he continued, "You haven't told me your name. Can I take a wild guess and assume that it's not Elaine?"

I laughed before I said, "It's Alizbeth, but everyone calls me Ali."

"Well, Alizbeth-"

"Ali."

"Alizbeth!"

"Ali!"

"Liz!"

"Ali!"

"Beth!"

"Ali!"

"Alice!"

"What?!"

"You know, like Alize but Alice."

I struggled to see the logic behind it, but I laughed all the same.

"I like it."

"Well, Miss Alice, I'm the Doctor."

"Doctor who?" I asked, as the ship reached the dock.

"Just the Doctor," he said, tying the boat to the pier and helping me out.

By now my dress was unbelievable heavy. I was just so bothered by it that I undid the zipper in the back and took it off. The Doctor looked at me with such wide eyes and shock.

"What? I have clothes on underneath."

I actually did. I had black shorts and a red top that matched my hair. Granted, they were both wet, but they didn't weigh me down as the dress did.

Finally, the Doctor managed to overcome his shock, shook his head, and said, "Uh, sorry, I didn't mean to stare-"

He was soon interrupted by my laughing.

"What?" he asked, confusement showing on his face as I kept laughing. "Stop it!"

"I'm sorry! It's just-you should have seen your face! You were all like-," I said, mimicking his expression.

"I was not!"

"You so were!"

By that time, we both were laughing so hard, some of the birds in the nearby trees were frightened away.

"You know what, Miss Alice? I like you," he said, grinning like a Cheshire cat.

I only smiled in return.

"How would you like to be my companion, on the greatest trip of your life?"

"... Where would we go?" I asked.

The Doctor walked off, shouting, "Follow me! Allon-sy!"

"What does that even mean?" I asked, catching up to him. For someone who was incredibly tall and lean, he sure could make a quick getaway.

"Allon-sy. It's French for 'Let's go'. Anyway, like I was saying, mind you, it will probably be the most dangerous trip of your life. But it will also be the most incredible. And you'll never feel the same again."

As he finished, he stopped in front of a blue, public call box. I remembered reading about them in my books about the history of the United Kingdom.

"It's just a box. What's so important about a box?"

He walked up to the door, unlocked it, opened it, and said, "Come inside and see for yourself."

I hesitated for a bit before following the Doctor into his blue box. I instantly was amazed by what I saw. The inside of the blue box, was the innards of a giant spaceship.

"It's big-," I started, before running outside. Sure enough, the blue box was the same size as it was before, even after I checked all the sides.

"But it's small-."

I ran back inside and said, "Is this magic or something?"

He gave me a funny look and said, "No, it's science."

Well, this wasn't the science I knew.

"It's called the T.A.R.D.I.S. That's Time And Relevant Dimension In Space."

"So you're an alien?" I asked, figuring that this was extraterrestrial.

"Yeah," he said, looking down at his Converse, almost like he was sad.

"Cool!"

He looked up at me with a funny look and said, "Really?"

"Yeah!"

"Molto bene! I like you even more!"

We both laughed at our outbursts before he got serious again.

"Miss Alice, would you like to come with me, on the adventure of a lifetime?"

I thought it over for a while, before I ran over to the doors, to the confusion of the Doctor, slammed them shut, and ran back over to the Doctor.

"Of course!"

He smiled once more, and said, "Well, in that case-"

"Allon-sy!"

"Hey, no fair! That's my line!"


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