Damn, I thought. I've fallen in love with the Ginger Doctor. What now?
Gratuitous fanfiction, of course!
This Doctor is the property of Steven Hancock and Lilly Nelson, as always. I'm just a silly little fangirl writing in the hopes that I'll be reviewed by someone.
Oh, and if you know where the Slow Boat Crispy Peking Duck comes from, and why it's so important that the Doctor doesn't cross her own timestream... then you're awesome. Also, we should talk. :-D
If you enjoyed this, check out my other two Ginger Chronicles fanfics.
Onto the story!
Jim Baker wanted to go somewhere interesting for breakfast.
The food dispenser in the TARDIS kitchen just wasn't cutting it. Sure, the fact that you could make practically any sort of food within seconds was pretty cool. Jim had been having fun experimenting with just how far it could go. (It couldn't, in fact, produce an elephant sandwich.) But the novelty wore off as soon as you realized that everything it made tasted faintly of cheese, and no matter how much ketchup you dumped on it, it wouldn't go away.
He had mentioned this to the Doctor at one point. She had waved a hand and muttered something to the effect that she would fix it when she had time. Which made no sense; they were in a time machine.
That was a week ago, relative time, and Jim was sick of cheese.
He was pretty sure Liz was, too.
It was time to confront the Doctor, then.
He stomped into the console room, where the Doctor was underneath the console, reading a copy of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. She barely glanced up as he entered, and turned a page. "Hi there. Any crisis you want me to avert?"
"You know how you said one time that any civilisation, left to its own devices, would develop intelligence of its own?"
She appeared to think for a minute. "I said that? How clever of me."
Jim folded his arms. "I'd like to present the jam jar in the kitchen cupboard as an example of that. It snapped at me when I tried to make toast."
"You were trying to eat it," the Doctor pointed out. "The jam is sentient now? Interesting. Maybe we should keep it as a pet…"
"I'm hungry," he told her frankly. "And I refuse to go into your deathtrap of a kitchen. Take us somewhere to get breakfast."
The Doctor put down her book, and sat for a moment, considering.
She looked up at Jim. "What about the soup cans?"
"They've fused together."
She drooped a bit. "Fine. Where do you propose we go?"
Jim shrugged. He really didn't care. "Pancakes in the future! A full continental breakfast in the Middle Ages! Doughnuts on Saturn! I don't know, you're the one with the time and space machine, you choose!"
The Doctor had been staring at him strangely since his third sentence. "But we can't get doughnuts on Saturn."
Jim glared. "I was being metaphorical."
"I wasn't. The doughnut place on Saturn went out of business three months after it opened. You see-"
But she was interrupted by the timely arrival of Liz Baker, which was good, because otherwise everyone would have had to endure through some really tortuous joke about rings and Jim may have committed homicide. And nobody would want that.
Liz looked half-asleep, and was wearing mismatching socks. She stumbled over to the console. "What's happening?"
"The Doctor is taking us somewhere interesting for breakfast," Jim announced cheerfully. The Doctor grumbled quietly, and moved over to set co-ordinates.
"Fine. You've twisted my arm. We're going to get the best food in the universe, then!"
Jim cast his mind around to consider what that could possibly be. "What?"
She flashed him and Liz a brilliant smile. "Peking Crispy Duck from the Slow Boat Chinese takeaway!"
Jim paused for a second, sure that this was some kind of joke.
"…when is this?" Liz asked.
The Doctor checked the scanner. "21st century Earth. And don't laugh. It is the best in the universe, and believe me; I've gone to some pretty extravagant places. The talking cows at Milliways don't even begin to compare to this. Come on!"
She twisted the door control and bounced out with the energy of a hyperactive puppy on some sort of miracle drug. Liz sighed, and followed, dragging Jim by the hand behind her, who looked as if he was regretting this already.
"So what's so good about this food?" Liz wondered, catching up to the Doctor.
The Doctor sighed with happiness. "It's the food of gods, Liz. It is literally the best crispy duck you will have ever tasted."
"How come we haven't heard about this, then?" Jim pointed out. "If it's so good-"
The Doctor shushed him, looking from left to right as if someone might be watching. "Don't tell anyone, but I've been keeping it a secret."
They crossed the road to the incongruous restaurant together, and ordered the duck before sitting down. They chatted about this and that for a while- before the Doctor brought up the little fact that the last time she had visited this place, there had been an incident involving vampires, and shortly after that, a murder.
Liz nearly choked on her next glass of water. "I'm sorry?"
"No more vampires here; don't worry!" the Doctor was quick to assure her. "Unless I got the date wrong…"
She rummaged through her pockets, pulling out random objects and placing them on the table. Their crispy duck arrived. Jim tasted a bit, and had to agree, it was the best.
"It's amazing," Liz grinned through a mouthful, all scepticism gone. The Doctor wasn't paying attention, instead trying to find her watch.
"Here it is," she exclaimed in relief, pulling out an ornate gold fob watch, and flipping it open. Little icons drifted across the main clock face, and they seemed to mean something to the Doctor. Her face held an interesting expression.
"Oh dear," she said eventually, sticking her fork into the platter of crispy duck and taking a bite.
Jim looked up. "Okay, what does that mean? Oh dear, I've forgotten my friend's birthday, or, oh dear, the world is about to end?"
"In the case of some of my friends, it could mean both," remarked the Doctor. "But it's more a case of, oh dear, I'm about to cross my own time stream."
"Plain English, please?" Liz requested.
"A younger version of me is about to enter this place in roughly, ooh, fifteen minutes," said the Doctor, checking her watch again. "We should probably leave, or it'll turn into a case of, oh dear, the world is about to end rather quickly."
Jim looked mournfully at the duck. "And I was just beginning to have a good breakfast."
The Doctor grinned. "Cheer up, Jim. We can always get takeaway."
She clapped her hands together, swinging off of her chair. "Right, you two. Who's up for toppling an anarchist government this morning? I'm sure there's somewhere in all of time and space that we can have some fun in!"
And, crisis averted, the three of them walked into the early morning sunlight, back to the TARDIS.
The End