The Doctor:

There was a massive space ship crash into Big Ben, and I had no clue what was going on. We couldn't get through the city towards it, not that I was expecting to be able to, but I would have liked a little bit of a closer look. "It's blocked off."

"We're miles from the centre." Rose sighed, looking at all the people around us, the cars at a stand still as the people legged it. Humans. "The city must be grid locked. The whole of London must be closing down."

"I know. I can't believe I'm here to see this. This is fantastic!" I grinned at her, then paused, seeing someone not running anywhere, just hidden a little down an alley way, hunched into a ball. They looked up after I saw them, and I saw a flash of blue eyes before they were running, a hat crammed onto her head, hiding what must have been a lot of hair. She could easily pass as a boy the way she was.

I wanted to run after her, and find out who she was and why she was hiding, but Rose brought me back on track. The spaceship ."Did you know this was going to happen?"

"Nope."

She raised an eyebrow. "Do you recognise the ship?"

"Nope."

Rose sighed a little. "Do you know why it crashed?"

"Nope."

"Oh, I'm so glad I've got you."

I just grinned even more, still looking for where the girl was going, but she knew this city better than I did. She lived on the streets. "I bet you are. This is what I travel for, Rose. To see history happening right in front of us."

"Well, let's go and see it." She smiled back, and I found myself caught on her face again. "Never mind the traffic, we've got the TARDIS."

That wasn't really a good idea. "Better not. They've already got one spaceship in the middle of London. I don't want to shove another one on top."

"Yeah, but yours looks like a big blue box. No one's going to notice."

Apart from my fanclub, and UNIT, and anything else that had cropped up over the years. There were a few detectives looking for it, wondering about it. I was avoiding them as long as possible. "You'd be surprised. Emergency like this, there'll be all kinds of people watching. Trust me. The TARDIS stays where it is."

Rose sighed even more, and I looked at her again. She was so gorgeous. "So history's happening and we're stuck here."

"Yes, we are."

"We could always do what everybody else does." That sounded good, what did everyone else do? "We could watch it on TV." Ah, great.

DW

Back at her flat, her mum still being incredibly rude towards me, I tried to listen to the TV, the news telling me that they'd been investigating it. Not that I could hear it because Jackie was talking incredibly loud, still going on about the year she'd been with me. I didn't mean to make her a year late!

And then something else happened.

They found a body in the wreck, something non-terrestrial, well, obviously, how long did that take you to work out, the fact that it was in a massive space ship, or the fact that it didn't look exactly the same as the rest of you? Rose's welcome home gathering was turning into a party, with wine, which knowing Jackie wouldn't end well, and it was getting steadily louder.

The body was being taken to a special unit mortuary, but they didn't know where. And then a toddler grabbed the remote, turning over to Blue Peter, something strange to be on TV at this time of night, but hey ho, maybe it was like Hollyoaks later or something. God, please, please tell me I did not like that programme in this regeneration, that would just be too embarrassing.

I managed to get it back of the kid, and turned it back to News 24, just in time to be told it was at Albion Hospital, and that they didn't know if it was alive or dead. Whitehall was denying everything as usual.

The hospital was closest to the river, and all the surrounding roads had been closed off. They'd moved patients out onto the streets, but still denying the confirmation of the alien body inside. How stupid was that?

Then they went on to say how the Prime Minister had disappeared, how people were criticising his lack of leadership, but then more people started coming out of cars and going into the house, apparently he was in charge of exported confectionery. Well, with the size of him... I could see that.

I got to my feet and tried to sneak off then, making it outside the flat before Rose caught me, and grabbed my shoulder. "And where do you think you're going?"

"Nowhere." I really couldn't lie very well in this form. "It's just a bit human in there for me. History just happened and they're talking about where you can buy dodgy top-up cards for half price. I'm off on a wander, that's all."

She laughed a little, shaking my head. "Right. There's a spaceship on the Thames and you're just wandering."

"Nothing to do with me." I shrugged. "It's not an invasion. That was a genuine crash landing. Angle of descent, colour of smoke, everything. It's perfect."

She didn't get the point. "So?"

"So maybe this is it. First contact. The day mankind officially comes into contact with an alien race. I'm not interfering because you've got to handle this on your own. That's when the human race finally grows up. Just this morning you were all tiny and small and made of clay. Now you can expand." I paused, hearing David Bowie singing Starman in the background. Humans. "You don't need me. Go and celebrate history. Spend some time with your mum."

Rose considered it. "Promise you won't disappear?"

"Tell you what." I fished in my pockets for a moment, and pulled out something. "TARDIS key. It's about time you had one. See you later."

I waved bye to her, and headed down to the TARDIS, but then paused, walking down a small side alley on a hunch. It was even grottier than the one from earlier, and I followed it to a dead end, and sighed. So much for the hunch.

But then something fell over behind me, and I turned just in time to see the girl running back down the alley. I followed her out, and saw her trying to hide behind the TARDIS. She didn't see me coming over, looking the wrong direction, so I went and sat next to her. "What you doing out here in the middle of the night?"

The girl jumped, her hat coming off and long ratted and tangled curled fell out, telling me she'd been out on the streets for a long time. That and the fact she was in tatty clothes that weren't exactly clean. "Hey, hey, I'm not here to hurt you, or call the social. I'm the Doctor, what's your name?"

At the mention of Doctor, she tried to scramble away from me and run, but I grabbed her arm and she hissed in pain, clutching at it. "I'm sorry. I didn't know it was hurt. Let me look, please." She relented, and I carefully helped her pull off the thick, but tattered coat she had on, looking at the scars and bruises on her arms, as well as the fact that her wrist was broken, and a lot more bones had been set wrong. "oh god... What happened to you?"

"T, they told me it was my fault. That I deserved it." She spoke so quietly I could barely hear her. She was an abuse victim. "M, my name's Jace."

I smiled a little bravely, knowing now why she was scared of Doctors. They warped her idea of them in her head. "Nice to meet you, Jace. I have some clothes and things if you want them. You can wash your hair, put on make up all that stuff a girl your age should be doing. How old are you?"

She lifted her head a little, making herself seem bigger. "16."

"No. Look at you, Jace, you don't need to lie to me. I can see right off you can't be older than 15 and that's being kind. Really, how old are you?"

Jace sighed a little, curling up smaller. This poor girl. "I, I'm 14."

14 and out on the streets. She'd been out for at least 2 years, and it had really taken its toll on her, what must have been long ash brown hair had turned darker, more black from the smog and everything she'd come into contact with. "Come on, Jace, I've got some clothes for you, as well as medical treatment and a hot shower."

She was too quiet and shy to say no, so I helped her to her feet and lead her into the TARDIS, hearing Mickey call after me, but I just led her inside, too tired to realise that it was so big until we'd dematerialised. "Jace, love, are you alright?"

"h, how b, big i, is this place?" She asked me, looking around in wonder and fear, making herself seem smaller by hugging her arms around herself. "I, it feels so big..."

I went over to her as we landed where we needed to be, only about 10 minutes early. "Jace, it's fine. It's bigger on the inside, but it's real, and so am I. You're not on the streets." She nodded a little and I carefully walked her through the TARDIS, first stopping to let her shower, where she came out with the colour hair I was expecting, ash brown, and her skin unmarked from any spots as she was bundled in a large white dressing gown. Next, I took her to the med room, where I carefully strapped up her wrist in a cast that would heal it in under a week.

She was just watching me silently through all of this, her blue eyes scared that at any moment I would start shouting, or hurt her further. "Why are you helping me?" She asked after a while. "No one ever see's me, let alone helps me..."

Oh this poor, poor girl. How long had she believed that people were out here to hurt her, to scare her into being perfect yet even then hurting her. "Because you deserve it. 14 years old and running from the abuse you must have gone through. Look, I'll give you a roof over your head, food, clothes and security, all you have to do is promise not to run. Promise not to be scared of me."

"W, w, why? D, don't you have a family of you own?" Jace asked me, and I sighed, thinking of my daughter and son back on Gallifrey. Caleb and Alyce. She looked like her a little. The same eyes. But she was gone now.

"No, I don't. But you don't have a family either, Jace. If you don't run, I can put myself into the Social records as your legal guardian, and whoever is after you, the people you were living with, they won't be able to get to you." She looked hopeful at that, and it told me she was considering it. "I promise, Jace."

After a moment, she nodded a little. "Y, yes. P, please. I, I, I can't go, go back to that..." Her face crumpled a little and she started crying, and I hugged her close, kissing her head as she sobbed, knowing that she must have been strong for so long. "T, t, thank you..."

"It's OK, Jace, I promise. Now, go get dressed, we're going to investigate some alien, alright?" Jace frowned a little, her eyes looking so young while full of tears. "It's what I do. I'm an alien, and I either help other aliens when they get stuck, or I stop them from hurting other people. That big ship, I need to make sure they're not going to hurt us, and the humans aren't going to hurt them."

"O, ok..." She nodded a little, wiping her eyes. Rose would like her, she was like the little sister she never had and Jace seemed like she needed a big sister. Once she started eating, and her needs were filled, she'd start puberty properly. I had no clue how to raise a teenage girl on my own. "D, do y, you have some clothes?"

I nodded and pointed to the door on the far wall. "Wardrobe through there, wear whatever you want as long as it fits and keeps you warm. You're freezing, Jace."

She went in, and I left instructions on how to go back to the console room and went over there, looking up the name Jace in missing persons.

1 Result:

Jaclyn Allison Monroe, North London, went missing from Foster care on the 23rd November 2003.

Single survivor of a car crash in 1998 that killed both her parents and younger sister Katie, leaving her orphaned at the age of 7. She was adopted by Jim and Sarah Campbell at the age of 9, and they reported her missing at the age of 12 when they found her missing.

No signs of Jaclyn have been found since now and it is though that she was taken and either murdered or moved across seas. Her adopted parents are still holding out hope that Jaclyn will be found safe and well, though the police are less than optimistic about this.

There was a picture of her there, and she looked completely different, big smiles and chubbier cheeks. An article about the crash was attached, and it said that they were thrown off a bridge by something, no foul play suspected. And there was one other thing on there. Her school record.

She was a genius, mostly in arts and music, being a grade 5 piano player by 9, and was just amazing at art and singing. And then she suddenly stopped performing or even turning up at school about a year into being adopted. She went off the map, her parents saying she'd been home schooled.

I turned the monitor off as she came into the console room, the piece of paper held tight in her hands. She looked a lot healthier now, in a pair of jeans, and a blue long sleeved top with a thick woollen cardigan over it all, as well as a pair of hard wearing work boots. "Better?" I asked her, seeing that her long hair was clean and brushed, spiralling down around her face as she hid behind it.

"Yes, thank you. S, so this is a space ship?"

"Yes, it is. It's called the TARDIS, that's Time and Relative Dimensions In Space. It can travel anywhere in time and space, but right now, we're in Albion Hospital, and we're going to meet an alien. You coming, Jacey?" I offered her my hand and she took it, letting me lead her out of the TARDIS silently as she stood close to me. She was trusting me fully, and for a girl who's been through all this, that's not a bad thing.

We'd landed in a store cupboard, and I lead her to the door, opening it with the sonic before telling her to be quiet and opening the door. And we walked into a room full of Red Berets - the Parachute Regiment. We stared at each other in silence for a moment, my new 14 year old friend staring at them in horror as the soldiers grabbed their weapons and pointed them at us.

And then someone screamed behind us, and I pulled Jace along with me, surprised at how easily the girl could keep up with me. "Defence plan delta! Come on. Move! Move!"

The girl who screamed was cowering by her desk a cut on her head that was steadily bleeding. "It's alive!" She told us, and Jace looked at me, looking scared again, but bending down to comfort the woman.

"Spread out. Tell the perimeter it's a lockdown." I told the marines, and the woman was still freaking a little. "Do it!" They all started running down the corridors, and I bent down with Jaclyn, who was stroking the woman's shoulder a little.

She shook her head. "I swear it was dead."

"Coma, shock, hibernation, anything. What does it look like?"

Then there was metal clattering at the far end of the room and Jace turned towards it even faster than I did. "It's still here." She whispered, her big blue eyes open wide. I gestured for a soldier to come and kneel by the woman and helped Jace to her feet, holding her hand again.

Behind a filing cabinet, we caught sight of something, and it was a pig. "Hello." We said together, and I saw Jace smile a little for the first time as she saw it was wearing a spacesuit. It ran out at on its hind legs and I shouted at the soldiers to not shoot. But of course, they didn't listen as another one shot it, Jace flinching at each shot and glared at the man. "What did you do that for? It was scared! It was scared."

We went back to the morgue with it, and Dr Sato was a little more stable now, as we examined the pig, Jace sat waiting patiently, playing with the cast on her wrist. I wondered how long it had actually been broken, because that must have been painful.

But then we found out something rather worrying. It was a real pig. "I just assumed that's what aliens look like, but you're saying it's an ordinary pig from Earth." Dr Sato repeated, and Jace raised her eyebrows, making a piggie face that made me smirk a little. She was alright now she wasn't so scared.

"More like a mermaid." Now it was a fish impression. "Victorian showmen used to draw the crowds by taking the skull of a cat, gluing it to a fish and calling it a mermaid. Now someone's taken a pig, opened up it's brain, stuck bits on, then they've strapped it in that ship and made it dive bomb. It must've been terrified. They've taken this animal and turned it into a joke."

"So it's a fake, a pretend, like the mermaid. But the technology augmenting its brain, it's like nothing on Earth. It's alien. Aliens are faking aliens. But why would they do that?" We were already walking back towards the TARDIS now, and she didn't notice. "Doctor? Jace?"

We dematerialised back into the Powell estate, and Rose came back in looking a little upset and nervous. "All right, so I lied. I went and had a look. But the whole crash landing's a fake. I thought so. Just too perfect. I mean, hitting Big Ben. Come on, so I thought let's go and have a look, and this is Jace, she's my new friend, slash Ward."

"My mum's here." Rose said, and Jace looked at me, frowning in confusion as she hugged her arm around herself, the injured one and hiding it under the cardigan. Used to hiding weaknesses. "And you're that street girl, you were hiding in all the alley over the last year or so."

Wait, Jackie was here. Jackie Tyler, great. "Oh, that's just what I need. Don't you dare make this place domestic." Which I'd kind of done by taking in the 14 year old, but oh well.

"You ruined my life, Doctor. They thought she was dead. I was a murder suspect because of you." Rickey told me, and I sighed, shaking my head, putting my arm around her shoulder, knowing the shouting wasn't going to be helping her at all.

"You see what I mean? Domestic."

He folded his arms at me, getting annoyed. "I bet you don't even remember my name. Seems to me you only like pretty teenagers, what with this girl."

"Ricky." I could remember people's names, it was places I was rubbish with.

"It's Mickey."

How stupid could you be, forgetting his own name. "No, it's Ricky."

"I think I know my own name."

"You think you know your own name? How stupid are you?"

And then Jackie walked back out, and Rose followed her, before coming back in. "That was a real spaceship. And you took some teenage runaway instead of me, are you serious?"

"Yep. And there is a bloody good reason she ran away, Rose, don't think she ran away from parent's who wouldn't give her a phone."

She looked a little shocked at my tone, protecting Jace, but quickly changed subject, while I started fixing something under the console. "So it's all a pack of lies? What is it, then? Are they invading?"

"Funny way to invade," Rickey pointed out. "Putting the world on red alert."

Actually, that was very well noticed. "Good point! So, what're they up to?"

"So, what're you doing down there?" I'd moved fully under it and he'd gotten very suspicious, while I could still see Jace sat on the jump seat, looking warily at Rose and Rickey.

"Ricky."

"Mickey."

How did he really not know his own name? "Ricky. If I was to tell you what I was doing to the controls of my frankly magnificent time ship, would you even begin to understand?"

He considered this. "I suppose not."

"Well, shut it, then. Jace, are you alright, love?"

"Y, yeah..." She said, nodding a little, still holding her wrist a little. "A, a little tired." Couldn't blame her to be honest. She was incredibly young and barely eating or drinking anything safe, and because of that her body's growth was really stunted. I hoped she'd be OK once she regulated..

And then I got what I needed, jumping back from under the console and looking at the monitor. "Got it! Ha, ha! Patched in the radar, looped it back twelve hours so we can follow the flight of that spaceship. Here we go. Hold on. Come on." Rose and Jace came over to look, and I saw the little genius working it out.

"I, it did a sling shot around the Earth f, first. I, it went up and came back down." She said, and I nodded.

Rose frowned, not understanding. "What does that mean?"

"Whoever those aliens are, they haven't just arrived, they've been here for a while." I told them, already feeling proud of how Jace was fitting in. "The question is, what have they been doing?"

I started doing something on the console, while Rickey and Rose started channel hopping, Jace awkwardly standing at the edge, before Rick glanced over at me. "How many channels do you get?"

"All the basic packages."

I so know where this was going. "You get sports channels?"

"Yes, I get the football. Hold on, I know that lot." I moved it onto the news channel again, and looked at the soldiers walking through the drive of Downing Street. "UNIT. United Nations Intelligence Taskforce. Good people."

Jace and Rose both frowned a little. "How do you know them?"

"'Cos he's worked for them." I looked at Rickey in surprise. How the hell did he know that? "Oh yeah, don't think I sat on my backside for twelve months, Doctor. I read up on you. You look deep enough on the Internet or in the history books, and there's his name, followed by a list of the dead."

"That's nice. Good boy, Ricky." I smiled a little, seeing that Jace wasn't paying attention to anything. She was half asleep on her feet.

"If you know them, why don't you go and help?"

I shrugged a little. "They wouldn't recognise me. I've changed a lot since the old days." Nearly half a dozen times. "Besides, the world's on a knife-edge. There's aliens out there and fake aliens. We want to keep this alien out of the mix. I'm going undercover. And er, I'd better keep the TARDIS out of sight. Ricky, you've got a car. You can do some driving."

He considered it a little. "Where to?"

"The roads are clearing." I smiled a little, taking Jace's hand. "Let's go and have a look at that spaceship. And food, Chinese, none of those rubbish chips."

We walked out of the TARDIS, and straight into a helicopter spotlight, police running right forwards. "Do not move! Step away from the box and raise your hands above your heads." Rickey and Jace pulled away, running, but only Rickey got out, Jace being manhandled kicking and screaming to get free.

Jackie came running out, screaming for her daughter to be let go, but she was just held back as the soldiers ran right past Rickey, hiding behind the bins. "Raise your hands above your head. You are under arrest."

I saw Jace get put in the car with the soldiers, handcuffs being forcibly put on her, and her crying in pain as it crushed her wrist. "Take me to your leader, as long as you take those off her."

They didn't listen but pushed Rose and I into a police car, where it was all plush and clean. "This is a bit posh. If I knew it was going to be like this, being arrested, I would have done it years ago." Well, you did grow up on a council estate, but there was no need to follow the stigma around them. Break it instead.

"We're not being arrested, we're being escorted. Though it's likely they'll call the social for Jace and I didn't get a chance to change her records." I sighed, seeing the car she was in behind us.

Rose pursed her lips a little. "She'll be fine. Where to?"

"Where'd you think? Downing Street."

Her eyes widened. "You're kidding."

"I'm not." Why would I kid about something like that?

She still didn't believe me. "10 Downing Street?"

"That's the one."

"Oh, my God. I'm going to 10 Downing Street? How come? And why are they bothering with Jace, she's just a kid."

"I hate to say it, but Mickey was right. Over the years I've visited this planet a lot of times, and I've been, er, noticed. And people with me are deemed important. You're lucky your man wasn't seen or he'd have been carted with us. But Jace is a missing persons, she's going to be put back with her foster parents, which won't be good."

Rose sighed a little. "Like my older cousin Charlotte, her dad hit her and they never found out. Not until she was hospitalised. I can see why she ran. But now they need you?"

"Like it said on the news. They're gathering experts in alien knowledge. And who's the biggest expert of the lot?"

She gave me a sly smile. "Patrick Moore?" Yes, the man who's never actually met another alien, clever.

"Apart from him."

"Oh, don't you just love it."

I shook my head, smiling at her teasing. "I'm telling you. Lloyd George, he used to drink me under the table." That reminded me actually. "Who's the Prime Minister now?"

"How should I know? I missed a year." And then we got out, and I gave a mug shot for the cameras, making Rose despair. "Oh, my God."

We got inside, and another man was talking to everyone, handing out ID cards. I saw Jace being held by a burly looking man in the corner and walked over. "Excuse me, I think you're holding my friend incredibly tight when she has a broken wrist."

"I've been told to keep her here until the meeting in convened." He replied, while Jace just silently cried, probably terrified about the prospect of being taken back. "Please return to where you're supposed to be."

This was not going well. "I'm not going anywhere. She's in my protection, and you're hurting her. She was fine with me, and she won't run, will you Jace?" She shook her head, and her hair fell over her face a little. "See? Now, I'm here as a guest, and she is with me. I want her back in my protection where she will not leave my side."

"Sir, I won't ask you again, please go back to where you are supposed to be. Jaclyn will be perfectly safe with me."

"Jace. My name is Jace." She growled, and then took a deep breath, using what little movement she had to grab the man's gun from the holster and holding it to his gut. "Uncuff me or I will shoot. I would rather go to juvie than back there."

Now, that was a good move. Not that I approved really, because it was a gun, but the man uncuffed her, and she turned, rubbing her wrist. "Thank you. I'll drop the gun when I'm far enough away, but you are not coming after me. I am not, going back into care." Then she backed away with me, dropping the gun just as we reached Rose again.

Rose smiled at her, and then gave her a small hug. "I'm sorry I was a bit of a cow."

"It's fine. I'm used to it. Besides, you gave me your coat not long before you disappeared." Smiling, she hid back behind me as we went over to the guy with all the ID cards.

"Ladies and gentlemen, can we convene? Quick as we can, please. It's this way on the right, and can I remind you ID cards are to be worn at all times." He handed one to me. "Here's your ID card. I'm sorry, your companion doesn't have clearance, and your younger companion is being looked after very well and she'll be taken back to her parents after the emergency has convened."

So lets not say that she's hiding behind my back, shall we? "I don't go anywhere without her. And Jace isn't who you think she is. Her name is Jace Smith, and she's my daughter." Lets hope that I could lie better to this guy, shall we.

"You're the code nine, not her. I'm sorry, Doctor. It is the Doctor, isn't it? She'll have to stay outside. And we've already confirmed with the missing persons report that she is in fact Jaclyn Monroe, and her parents are looking forwards to getting her back."

"Her name is Jace Smith. And she's staying with me."

The man gave up arguing about Jace, who knew to be silent behind my back. "Look, even I don't have clearance to go in there. I can't let her in and that's a fact."

"It's all right. You go." Rose told me, smiling a little as another woman came over, looking a little nervous about something. Well, the world was on red alert, I supposed.

"Excuse me. Are you the Doctor?"

I nodded at her. "Sure."

"Not now. We're busy." The ID man sighed, shaking her head at her. "Can't you go home?"

The woman didn't give up. "I just need a word in private."

"I suppose so. Don't get in any trouble." I told Rose, before walking into the room, sneaking Jace in with me. She was my main concern right now. They'd make sure that she went back with her parents.

The Sub Prime Minister was addressing everyone at the front, and I sat Jace next to me, checking to make sure her wrist was alright before looking to the front. "Now, ladies and gentlemen, if I could have your attention, please. As you can see from the summaries in front of you, the ship had one porcine occupant."

"Of course, the really interesting bit happened three days ago, see, filed away under Any Other Business. The North Sea. A satellite detected a signal, a little blip of radiation, at one hundred fathoms, like there's something down there. You were just about to investigate and the next thing you know, this happens. Spaceships, pigs, massive diversion. From what?"

Jace's eyes widened a little, standing up besides me, her super smart brain going over board. "If aliens fake an alien crash and an alien pilot, what do they get? You. They get all of you. It's not a diversion, it's a trap. Doctor..."

"This is all about us." I agreed, taking her hand. "Alien experts. The only people with knowledge how to fight them gathered together in one room." Someone at the front with the Prime Minister let a massive one rip, making Jace and I look at him in bemusement. "Excuse me, do you mind not farting while we're saving the world?"

He gave a sly smile. "Would you rather silent but deadly?" And then the General removed his cap, unzipping his forehead which filled the room with a blue light, Green laughing at it.

"We are the Slitheen." Well, I hadn't heard of them before.

"Thank you all for wearing your ID cards. They'll help to identify the bodies." Green held up a remote activation switch, and we all started getting electrocuted through the cards. Leaving Jace watching in horror as what used to be the General walked towards her.

"Hello, little smart girl. Are you ready to play?"