Mother Who: Homesick Thief
At first zeal had overcome the boy – a machine, which could carry you anywhere you wanted to, different time and place, even to paraller universes! Technically, he was just borrowing it from Prof. Andonuts – of course, without returning it. Not like that old geezer would do anything with the machine, after the annoying Ness and his friends had saved their world from Giygas. The "borrowing" would be noticed – sooner or later – but they wouldn't have a chance of getting it back.
Boy knew it as sure as his dislike for steak.
And so, the boy travelled everywhere he wanted, mostly by testing results of pressing buttons in different orders. He found himself in past, where creatures huge as mountains roamed on the surface and even little insects were as huge as cars! He visited the future, where steel and electricity ruled the world as a king and queen, and the buildings challenged clouds in height. Some where even floating on the ground.
But where ever he went and saw, he did not enjoy it for long. He did not know why he felt such, wasn't he free of all the shackels he had been binded? There wasn't anyone who could punish him if he didn't do as told, order him around, or pity him like he was some kind of abandomed animal. There was no angry parents, no squeaky and cheeky little brother, no everyone-loves-me-because-I'm-so-nice neighbour boy, who'd ruin his fun with his friends, no crazy and twisted alien being...
" Everything should be fine, isn't that right Pokey?"
One day, when Pokey had trouble deciding next place, where to go, suddenly the machine started to move itself. " Stop it, I didn't say you could move on your own!" Pokey tried to command the machine, but it was like a bolted horse – it didn't listen what Pokey said, and threw him at the floor with uncontrollable shaking. " Why can't this pile of junk fly straight?" Pokey moaned, when he hit his head in the nothing-but-soft landing. He whiped his blond hair off his face and towed himself first at a standing position, and then out of the damned machine.
" Looks like you got hit by a timestorm, what a bad luck", a voice sounding suprising friendly spoke, " Did you get hurt?"
" I'm fine", Pokey said bluntly, looking suspiciously at the weird man, whom the voice belonged. "
" That's a relief, these recent timestorms are quite feisty", the man chatted as if he had spoke about normal weather.
" Timewhat?" Pokey asked confused, " And who are you?"
" You travel in time and space, but you don't know what a timestorm is?" the man replied with a question, " Well, judging by your Tardis, it does look...unique. Unique in a good way."
The man walked over Prof. Andon- Pokey's shaped vessel. Pokey disliked that the stranger went so close to it – who'd know, maybe he'd sabotage it!
" You didn't answer my questions", Pokey tried to get man's attention away from his machine.
" I'm the Doctor. And I presume you're called Pokey ", the man said glancing the "unique" machine for a moment, and then turning to Pokey, " we need to have a little chat."
Pokey was baffled to find a response with words – Was this "Doctor" a mindreader? - and he closed his opened mouth and nodded. He could had answered negative, but there was something about this man's voice, which told him to answer yes. And even if had chosen "no", Doctor would have probably continued his talking, liked Pokey it or not.
Now, when he was silent, Pokey had a chance to look around for the first time. He has his machine had landed at a some sort of beach. Not a beach like in Summers, the sand was almost as white as several days old snow at the edge of a busy road. In front of him, huge cliffs of same colour rose to form an unclimbable wall, which only let the sky pass over it. Behind him he could heard waves harsly hit the coastline.
Pokey noticed a strange blue police box, one like in those cards from faraway lands, which his parents got from their colleagues and relatives, next to Doctor.
"Is that thing yours?" Pokey pointed at the box.
" Yes, it's mine. My Tardis. Time and Relative Dimension in Space." Doctor had a look of a proud daddy, whose kid had just scored a goal in a school's football match.
Pokey didn't see that look on the face of his father. Not that he had ever played football, he hated that game almost as much as baseball.
" It looks ridiculous", Pokey commeneted, ignoring the fact that anyone could say the same about his machine.
" I like it that way", Doctor didn't seem to get angry of Pokey's comment, only smiled at it. " Why are you called as the "Doctor"? Are you a dentist?"
" I haven't tried to be dentist yet", Doctor admitted.
" Good, I don't like dentists", Pokey told. He wondered why had told that in the first place. Usually he would tell nothing about himself to a stranger, at least not after Giygas and his damned plans. But on the other hand, he hadn't talked to anyone for...how much time ago? Pokey wasn't sure.
A sudden wave of homesickness hit Pokey. The feeling was so terribly strong that he felt nauseastic.
While Pokey tried to cough his feelings to settle, Doctor watched him with a compassionate look on his face.
" You can still turn back, you know."
Astounded Pokey lift his face up to Doctor. " What do you mean?" he asked when he finally stopped the coughing.
" You can still go back, to your own time and place. In the world, where your home is. Not everyone is so lucky."
" No, I don't want to go back, don't pretend you understand me-!"
Doctor took Pokey's head to his hands and pulled it close to his own. Pokey tried to resist, but when the images started to appear, he stopped.
A red-orange planet with two suns, a city inside a glass-like shepre. Silver trees, orange sky.
People. Friends, realatives, family.
Everyone looked happy.
A great war between these people and robot-like creatures.
A man, who sees how rotten the both sides, even his own, has become.
He has no other option left than to end this war by destroying both of the races.
The same man, running away from what he had done.
The lonely man, last of his kind.
A man, who has a name of the one who saves people's lives.
Images blurred in to a whirl of emotions. Pokey felt as if his head were exploding, and backed away from the Doctor.
" Don't pretend you understand me!" he repeated and ran as if the devils of his mind were after him to his timemachine. In panic and in hope to get as far away from "the Doctor" as possible, he hurriedly pressed the contoller's buttons. Before Doctor could do or say anything, Pokey dissappeared with his machine in a flash of light. " I am free to do whatever I want!" Pokey told to himself, trying to silence the little voice back of his head. It said: " You share the same loneliness with that man, and you both suffer from it.."
The Doctor didn't do anything to stop Pokey, who knows if he has a power to do that. He sighed disappointed, not at the boy but to himself. " Perhaps I should've been more subtle with him." It also irked him that he didn't have a chance to take a peek inside the boy's timemachine. Only if he had had more time...a Time-Lord without enough time, what a laugh.
" Those two are like us, don't you think?" the Doctor spoke to his oldest companion, which he had stolen from a museum in an order to see and study the vast world of time and space. It did not give a reply, but it wasn't needed – Doctor knew what kind of answer it would've given to him if they had been able to communicate.
"Did I do what was right, or should I had left things as they were? Watch how worlds and lives would destroy or try to avoid that? I know myself now, I cannot stay put and silent. I've been always the rebellious one, like that boy. I hope he'll open his eyes, one day."
Tardis's soft whirr sounded as an understanding and supportive answer , which cheered the Doctor up from a momentary sorrow.
" Right, where shall we go next? How does North Pole sound like? I've always wanted to see the Aurora Borealis. And some say there's nothing beautiful on that planet, can you believe? It's funny how humans think they are caused by a solar storm hitting the planet's athmosphere. Actually, they are really.."