The TARDIS maintained a semi-official diurnal cycle. Currently, it was something like night. While the Doctor required little sleep, he found that the environmental alteration was comfortable for him as well as any of current companions who had the need to sleep. While he certainly had a need for companionship, the Doctor liked this quiet hours alone. He often spent them reading and currently, he was browsing through a book on his way to the console room. He didn't expect to meet anyone coming around the corner. The Doctor's book bumped hard into Tegan's shoulder, sending her staggering. He reached out and steadied her. "Excuse me, Tegan. I... didn't... expect..." he trailed off. Tegan gazed blankly past him, then started moving again without a word.
That's when he realized she was walking in her sleep. "'Her eyes are open. Aye, but their sense is shut,'" he quoted, following her. The aptness of Shakespeare's description of the somnambulist Lady MacBeth bore witness to the long history of this phenomenon in humans. The Doctor had never personally witnessed it. Tegan was likely going to have a bruise on her shoulder yet she had made no sound of pain; she had barely reacted to the blow and not at all to his presence.
He wanted to see where she was going, but first, he was going to experiment a little. He walked quickly past her and stood in her way. She came slowly towards him with a pace like one who walked inside one of those dreams where the body feels weighted and sluggish.
Nighttime Tegan looked very different to him from Daytime Tegan, and after a moment he decided that this was due to several factors. One: the vagueness of her expression. Tegan's expression was usually direct and forceful. Two: no makeup. Usually her face was done up in a way that made him understand why the wearing of cosmetics was sometimes referred to as war paint. Tegan's makeup asserted her presence and identity. Three: instead of that perpetual mauve air hostess uniform, she was wearing a white lacy nightdress that Nyssa must have supplied. It was sleeveless and flowing and the hem reached well past her knees. The combination of nightdress and unadorned face made her look hardly older than Nyssa. It was not Tegan's style at all to look young and defenseless. The gown actually did not make her look I like /I Nyssa. He chose not to catalogue the obvious physical differences; the Doctor had the notion that Tegan would not appreciate being seen this way by him. On the other hand, he was not going to let her wander all over the TARDIS in this state.
Nearing him, Tegan simply moved to one side to pass the obstacle the Doctor presented. Her gaze went through and past him and he turned to accompany her again. He had never done any serious study of somnambulism, but it looked as if he would need to do some reading up on it. The Doctor was sure that the old warning about not waking a sleepwalker was superstition, yet he didn't move to wake her. It was a different experience of the woman to spend time in her presence when she wasn't angry or frightened or sulking. Somewhere inside that loud Tegan was this quiet lost soul. "Mmmm," the Doctor hummed fretfully. Poetry aside, she was cold. He could see the effect of the temperature on her body. Abruptly, he whipped off his coat and put it around her shoulders, having to hold her still to drape it around her. When finally he had gotten the coat to hang without falling off, he stepped back. Tegan didn't move away. Her eyes drifted shut. Then she simply folded herself down onto the floor, curled up into a tight ball under his coat, and fell deeply asleep under the gaze of a most disconcerted Time Lord.
"I didn't anticipate that. Now what's to be done?" The Doctor studied the young woman. For all her forceful personality, she was petite and lightly built. "Can't sleep here, young lady," he said resignedly, and then knelt down to scoop her up coat and all. The only response she made was to push her face into his sweater. The Doctor carried Tegan to her room. She had taken one near Nyssa's. Perhaps they should share, if Tegan stayed on the TARDIS much longer. They had already formed a friendship and Nyssa had a peaceful aura that might counteract whatever urged Tegan to sleepwalk.
Tegan had left her door open. The Doctor nudged it open wider and carried Tegan over to the bed. Slowly, he set her down untangling his coat from her body. He pulled the duvet over her and tucked her in, smiling to himself. She would not be at all pleased to hear about this. Fortunately, by the time she woke up he would have armed himself with solid scientific explanations and hopefully, a solution for this problem. The possibility of somnambulistic humans wandering into the console room and randomly pushing buttons could not be tolerated.
Abruptly, he straightened and looked down at the sleeping woman. Maybe this wasn't the first time she'd walked. It could have something to do with the embarrassing inability of the TARDIS to arrive at Heathrow.
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"Yes, a few times when I was a child. I'm sorry! It's not like I do it on purpose!"
Tegan looked like she couldn't decide whether to cry or to yell at the Doctor. Neither expression was improved her puffy-eyed appearance. The Doctor took a firm grip of his temper. "I'm not saying you do, Tegan, but it's not safe for you to go sleepwalking in the TARDIS. I can ask Nyssa to come sit in on the session. I'm not sure you trust me yet, but you trust her, don't you?"
"It's not that I don't trust you—" Tegan looked at the Doctor's expression and threw her hands up. "Fine. Go ahead, then, hypnotize me."
He didn't know what expression he was wearing at the moment, but he was sure it was not pleasant. Couldn't she have agreed without all that arguing? She was the most infuriating woman he'd ever met! Human or otherwise. The Time Lord reminded himself that he was from an advanced society with knowledge from the highest levels of education that society had to offer, not to mention centuries of experience in the field. He could be calm; he could be civil. No need to let one temperamental Australian girl from the 20th century get under his skin.
"You need to be more relaxed. Why don't you tell me about sleepwalking as a child?"
Tegan scowled down at her hands knotted in her lap. The Doctor braced himself for a curt refusal, but instead she began to speak. "The time I remember best happened when I was seven. We were visiting my grandfather in England. My room was up a bit of stairs, under the eaves. Early one morning, when it was barely light, I woke up and found I'd bumped my shins on the foot of the stairs and tripped. My legs were muddy to the knees and I had grass stains all over. Mum was worried something fierce because I couldn't remember where I'd been or what happened." She looked up at him then, with a hostile gaze that the Doctor realized wasn't fully directed at him. "Gran Verney said I'd been off dancing with the fairies."
The Doctor smiled. "She sounds like a delightful woman."
"She was…" Tegan's face softened unsmilingly and she looked down again.
Ah, the lady was dead. Humans. He was very fond of them, but he hated these awkward little moments. There was hardly time to get to know them before they were about to die on you. The Doctor chided himself: he knew humans who had packed more living into their short span than many a Time Lord did in millennia. "Is that what you think you were doing? How did you feel about it?"
"I hated the fuss. I wanted to run right back out into the woods. I always felt safe in England. The land is so tame. Not like the Outback. I could have ended up a dingo's dinner, sleepwalking there."
The Doctor carefully hid his surprise. Tegan, with her high heels and made up face, looked like a complete city girl. He would have never guessed her for someone who liked the outdoors. "You've spent a lot of time in the Outback?"
"My father had property there for a while, when I was small, big enough for his own private landing strip. Mum always said it was like being on another planet." Tegan shook her head, finally smiling a little.
"You could tell her better now," the Doctor joked gently.
"No. I was thinking she was more right than she knew. You could go places, not so far away, so close you could still see our house, and you'd be in another world. You'd just…" Tegan stopped there. The Doctor waited quietly to see if she'd continue. He wanted to know, curious chap that he was, what she would say if he left the silence open for her.
"In your head." Tegan gave the shrug and sulky jut of her chin that made him want to shake her. His companions were generally either good with words (like Liz Shaw or Sarah Jane) or uncomplicated sorts like Jamie or Leela. There was definitely an alien world in Tegan Jovanka's head. The Doctor would marshal armies of reason and logic in his arguments only to find them stymied by the iron mass of her stubbornness.
Perhaps Tegan was expecting the corny old pocket watch routine, but the Doctor didn't need anything but his voice to hypnotize a human. He thought he'd do better with Tegan if there wasn't anything obvious for her to set her will against. She told him about her father letting her sit in his lap at the controls of the plane and how she could see the sky bare and blue from horizon to horizon. With questions and suggestions in a low voice, he led her through images until she had reached a deep trance.
"Tegan, please listen to me carefully. Whatever troubles you may have, you will face them better with a good night's sleep. If you feel a need to get up in the night, pat your pillow three times then go back to sleep. Please, Tegan, show me how you go back to sleep. Pat the pillow three times." Tegan patted her hands on her thighs three times. "How do you feel right now, Tegan?"
"I feel fine."
"Good. Remember how you flew your father's plane here? Now you're going to fly it back. And when you land, you will be fully awake." He guided her out of the trance, saying at the last, "You've almost landed. Anything you wish to remember, you will remember. Feel the tires touching down. You've made a perfect landing. Your father is proud of you."
Tegan drew a deep breath. "What's going to happen now? Or did you…? I was flying."
"You've been in a trance, Tegan. The process went smoothly and you should sleep well from now on."
"Nyssa's asked me to share a room with her."
"I'm glad to hear it. She likes you."
"And I like her. I don't see how anyone couldn't like Nyssa. She's so polite and friendly." Tegan tugged at her lower lip with her teeth. "Are we done now, Doctor?"
"Yes, all done."
Tegan stood up. "Thanks for your trouble. It… I mean, especially since I'll be home soon. I hope it wasn't a waste of your time," she said awkwardly.
"My time is never wasted," the Doctor said loftily, "That's what it means to be a Time Lord." Then he belied the stuffiness with a grin.
"Thank you, your lordship—oh, rabbits, I can't curtsey in this." Abandoning her attempt at a curtsey, Tegan departed tugging at her skirt.
Rabbits? Oh, yes—Australian. He was a little sorry Tegan was leaving, for Nyssa's sake. The Traken girl was devastatingly and completely orphaned. The Doctor wondered what she saw in Tegan and hoped that she wouldn't miss the human girl. Speaking of which, he'd better overhaul that navigation circuit. Next stop: Heathrow, 1981.