Two Time Lords
It was actually quite a bit more difficult than Adelaide expected to pilot a half-destroyed TARDIS with a newly regenerated Time Lord who didn't really want to talk to her. Especially because while she understood a bit about piloting a TARDIS this old, it wasn't enough with it in the current situation.
It had been a problem she'd faced as she and the Master had attempted to escape the Time War, though her TARDIS had been newer and nowhere near as damaged as this one was.
It also didn't help that the Doctor kept managing to be thrown out the doors. Adelaide didn't actually understand how that kept happening; it wasn't that hard to hold onto the console when the TARDIS jerked. She did keep managing to control the TARDIS long enough that he could pull himself back inside, and then he would just fall outside again.
She had been trying not to land it anywhere, just bring them into the vortex until the Doctor could help her get enough control, but that didn't seem to be working.
Adelaide was actually quite impressed that she able to landed the breaking TARDIS on her own…though it was more like crash-land.
She wished the Doctor had just chosen a more recent TARDIS when he'd run from Gallifrey, like she had. Those were so much easier to pilot.
When they crashed, the interior of the TARDIS tipped to the side, sending the Doctor sliding through the corridors while she held onto a bit of the console. She sighed as he rolled past her, and winced when she heard a splash.
Above her, the doors to the TARDIS opened and Adelaide began to attempt to pull herself up by the railing…only for a grappling hook thrown by the Doctor to nearly hit her in the head. She switched to that and popped her head out of the TARDIS, taking a few breaths of fresh air before looking down.
There was a little ginger girl staring at her, looking quite surprised. "Hello there," Adelaide grinned. "Sorry about this; going to be hell to clean up." She pulled herself up more, swinging her legs to hang outside the TARDIS. "We'll have to wait for the other one; I think he fell into the swimming pool, though I'm not quite sure how deep that is."
The Doctor reappeared next to her, looking completely soaked. "Could I have an apple?" he asked. "All I can think about. Apples. I love apples. Maybe I'm having a craving? That's new. Never had cravings before."
Adelaide frowned. "You've never had a craving?" she mumbled. She didn't actually know the adverse effects of putting off the regeneration as long as the Doctor had. Perhaps you did get extremely forgetful that you'd ever had things like cravings.
The Doctor pulled himself up so he was sitting on the edge of the TARDIS as well. "Whoa. Look at that!"
The girl frowned at him. "Are you okay?"
He shrugged. "Just had a fall. All the way down there," he leaned forward so that he nearly fell back in, "right to the library. Hell of a climb back up."
"You're soaking wet."
"I was in the swimming pool."
"You said you were in the library."
He just shrugged again. "So was the swimming pool."
The girl eyed them. "Are you policemen?"
The Doctor frowned. "Why? Did you call policemen?"
"Did you come about the crack in my wall?"
"What cra-ah-ah-argh-ha!" the Doctor fell off the TARDIS and Adelaide raised an eyebrow as she studied him.
The girl stepped back. "Are you all right, mister?"
He sat up. "No, I'm fine. It's okay. This is all perfectly norm…" he was cut off by a bit of extra regeneration energy floating from his mouth.
Adelaide highly doubted that this was normal. Regenerations were never nearly this violent. She leapt off of the TARDIS much more gracefully then the Doctor had, brushing a bit of soot from her pants. She really should have looked into changing; this sweater just wouldn't do. When she looked up again, the girl was staring at both of them with a frown. "Yes?" she prompted.
"Who are you?"
The Doctor grinned, holding up a glowing hand. "I don't know yet. I'm still cooking." He paused. "Does it scare you?"
The girl grimaced. "No, it just looks a bit weird."
"No, no, no. The crack in your wall. Does it scare you?"
"Yes."
The Doctor leapt to his feet at such a speed that Adelaide had to back up just to avoid getting hit in the face by one of his flailing limbs. "Well then, no time to lose. I'm the Doctor."
"Adelaide," she said, giving a little wave, though she was keeping watch on the Doctor to ensure he didn't actually fall over again.
"Do everything I tell you, don't ask stupid questions, and don't wander off." The Doctor took a few steps forward, seeming to have gotten the hang of everything…until he ran directly into a tree. Adelaide just sighed.
"Are you alright?"
"Early days. Steering's a bit off."
|C-S|
Somehow, miraculously, the Doctor managed to get to Amelia's kitchen without any really dangerous falls. That's not to say it didn't take him three times to climb the staircase because he kept claiming that a step had randomly appeared.
Adelaide found quite a kinship in the little girl, who watched the Doctor's antics with raised eyebrows and the occasional laugh.
Once they were inside, Adelaide left the Doctor standing in the middle of a doorway while the girl, who'd told her that her name was Amelia, found him an apple. "If you're a doctor, why does your box say Police?"
The Doctor grabbed the apple and took a bite out of it, though he only chewed it twice before spitting it, quite violently, back out. "That's disgusting. What is that?"
Adelaide raised her eyebrows. She had a feeling she'd be doing that a lot if she continued to spend time around the Doctor. His previous regeneration had been much calmer, much more contained. Except, of course, when he tried to manipulate the laws of time because he believed himself to be the last of his species. Then he'd gotten a bit out of hand. "That's an apple."
He frowned. "Apple's rubbish. I hate apples."
Amelia glanced at Adelaide. "You said you loved them."
"No, no, no. I like yogurt. Yogurt's my favorite, give me yogurt!" Amelia found him a container from the fridge and the Doctor practically chugged it, before giving it the same reaction as the apple. "I hate yogurt. It's just stuff with bits in."
"You said it was your favorite."
The Doctor shrugged, grinning. "New mouth. New rules. It's like eating after cleaning your teeth. Everything tastes wron-argh!" he jerked his arm, hitting himself in the forehead before straightening like nothing happened.
Amelia shook her head. "What is it? What's wrong with you?"
"Wrong with me? It's not my fault. Why can't you give me any decent food? You're Scottish." The girl's accent had made that obvious enough. "Fry something."
Amelia got to work on frying bacon while Adelaide hunted through the first floor of the home for a towel. She kept being worried the Doctor would just shake his head like a dog. Adelaide liked strange and odd and dangerous, but it was a bit too difficult to really enjoy the Doctor when he was very obviously attempting to ignore her completely.
She knew why. They were still strangers, and now wasn't really the time to get to know the other.
Especially now that the Doctor was also in the process of figuring out what type of person he actually was in this regeneration.
Adelaide had just thrown the towel against his face, getting the first actual look of that regeneration, when Amelia put the plate of bacon in front of him. And he spat it out again. "Bacon. That's bacon?" He glared. "Are you trying to poison me?"
Amelia made him a pan of beans…and the Doctor hated that too.
Adelaide hated cleaning, and she was beginning to get the feeling that they'd have to clean Amelia's entire house by the end of it if the Doctor kept just spitting food out without actually hitting the plate. She was normally a neat person, so cleaning was never a problem, but she always believed in respecting hosts.
It was what had kept her from getting killed quite a few more times than she had.
Next, Amelia tried bread and butter…only for the Doctor to throw it out the door and, by the sound of it, hitting a cat. "And stay out!" he called after it, returning to the kitchen and opening the fridge, Amelia coming beside him.
"We've got some carrots," she offered.
"Carrots? Are you insane? No." He paused, frowning. "Wait. Hang on. I know what I need. I need…I need…" he began to search through her freezer "fish fingers" now the fridge again "and custard." When he stepped back with a grin, Adelaide could only shrug.
They were aliens; it made sense that human food wouldn't actually taste that nice to them, especially right after a regeneration, when she could admit that taste buds were a bit messed up anyways.
As the Doctor worked to prepare his fish fingers and custard mixture, Adelaide grimaced at the mess he had made. She really should clean it…but she really didn't want to. Amelia saw her expression. "My aunt will clean it in the morning."
That only made Adelaide frown. Technically, it should be the Doctor cleaning, since he'd been the one to make the mess, but she had been the one to land the TARDIS in the girl's backyard, and this was the aunt's house.
Oh, goodness, it had been a long time since she'd had to deal with any of this, though that hadn't been by choice.
Finally, the Doctor sat at the table, munching on his fish fingers and custard, while Amelia sat across from him eating ice cream from the tub. She'd offered some to Adelaide but she'd politely refused, just taking a seat at the end of the table between the two of them.
Amelia nodded. "Funny."
The Doctor frowned. "Am I? Good. Funny's good. What's your name?"
"Amelia Pond."
He grinned. "Oh, that's a brilliant name. Amelia Pond. Like a name in a fairytale."
Adelaide frowned at the window across from her. "Are we in Scotland?"
Amelia shook her head. "No. We had to move to England. It's rubbish."
The Doctor nodded. "So what about your mum and dad, then? Are they upstairs? Thought we'd have woken them by now."
"I don't have a mum and dad." Both the Doctor and Adelaide started at the tone in Amelia's voice. She was rather casual about the concept of not having parents. "Just an aunt."
The Doctor shrugged. "I don't even have an aunt."
Amelia nodded. "You're lucky."
He looked towards Adelaide. "I know."
Adelaide didn't look at him. "Where is your aunt?"
"She's out."
Both Time Lords' eyes widened, but it was the Doctor spoke. "And she left you all alone?"
"I'm not scared!"
He shrugged. "Course you're not. You're not scared of anything. Box falls out of the sky, man falls out of a box, man eats fish custard, and look at you, just sitting there. So you know what I think?"
"What?"
"Must be a hell of a scary crack in your wall."
|C-S|
It had been a while since Adelaide had been able to sense oddities about time and space, but thankfully it seemed to be an ability that didn't require much practice, at least for a Time Lady. The moment she set eyes on the crack her stomach churned and given the Doctor's expression he was having a very similar reaction.
The Doctor ran his fingers down the crack. "You've had some cowboys in here. Not actual cowboys, though that can happen."
"I used to hate apples," Amelia said quietly, and Adelaide glanced back to see her holding an apple, "so my mum put faces on them." She walked over and gave it to the Doctor, the Time Lords smiling at the sight of the smiling face.
The Doctor nodded. "She sounds good, your mum. I'll keep it for later."
Adelaide turned back to the crack. "This wall is solid and the crack doesn't go all the way through." She held her hand up against it, feeling the tiniest bit of a breeze. "Where's the draft coming from?"
The Doctor ran his sonic along the crack. "Wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey. You know what the crack is?"
"What?"
"It's a crack." He nearly pressed his face right against the crack, while Adelaide was being very careful not to actually touch the crack, since they didn't actually know what it was. "But I'll tell you something funny. If you knocked this wall down, the crack would stay put, because the crack isn't in the wall."
Amelia frowned. "Where is it then?"
"Everywhere. In everything." This time, the Doctor looked towards Adelaide, acknowledging both of their responsibilities as Time Lords, which was honestly not something she'd done often. They may be strangers forced together by the Time War, but they were still Time Lords. "It's a split in the skin of the world. Two parts of space and time that should never have touched, pressed together right here in the wall of your bedroom. Sometimes…" he pressed his ear against the crack again "can you hear?"
Amelia nodded. "A voice. Yes."
The Doctor emptied a glass of water beside Amelia's bed and used it to listen. "Prisoner Zero?"
"'Prisoner Zero has escaped'. That's what I heard. What does it mean?"
He stepped back. "It means that on the other side of this wall, there's a prison and they've lost a prisoner. And you know what that means?"
"What?"
Adelaide shrugged. "You need a better wall." Without speaking, she and the Doctor moved Amelia's desk away from the wall. "You're going to need to open it all the way."
He nodded. "The forces will invert and it'll snap itself shut. Or…"
"What?"
"You know when grown-ups tell you everything's going to be fine and you think they're probably lying to make you feel better?"
Amelia sighed. "Yes."
"Everything's going to be fine." He took Amelia's hand and pointed his sonic at the crack.
The room was filled with a brilliant white light as the crack opened. "Prisoner Zero has escaped," a voice said. "Prisoner Zero has escaped."
The Doctor stepped forward slowly, keeping Amelia behind him. "Hello? Hello?" He took a few steps back when a large eyeball completely filled the space and Adelaide recognized it as an Atraxi.
"What's that?" Amelia asked.
The Atraxi shot a bolt of light directly at the Doctor's pocket and, as he doubled over, the crack closed. "There, you see? Told you it would close. Good as new."
"What's that thing? Was that Prisoner Zero?"
Adelaide shook her head. "That was Prisoner Zero's guard."
"Whatever it was…" the Doctor began, but Adelaide interrupted him.
"Atraxi." He turned to her. "That was an Atraxi. Galactic police force? No?" She sighed. "It sent you a message?" Given how much traveling he'd done, Adelaide had just expected he would recognize an Atraxi the moment he saw one. It appeared, however, that he did not, though, she supposed, the Doctor may never have stayed behind on a world he visited long enough for an Atraxi to visit. Not to say she had encountered them often…honestly, most of the time she was running from the Atraxi instead of actually interacting with them.
The Doctor nodded, pulling out his psychic paper. "Psychic paper," he said to Amelia, who was looking at it curiously. "Takes a lovely little message. 'Prisoner Zero has escaped'." He frowned. "But why tell us? Unless…"
"Unless what?"
"Unless Prisoner Zero escaped through here." He shook his head, looking around the room. "But he couldn't have. We'd know." The Doctor ran from the room, stopping on the landing, turning in a circle. "It's difficult. Brand new me. Nothing works yet. But there's something I'm missing. In the corner…" he turned slower "of my eye."
They were interrupted by the Cloister Bell of the TARDIS. The Time Lords ran out of the house, the Doctor shouting as he did so, and Amelia followed.
"I've got to get back in there!" he shouted once they reached the garden. "The engines are phasing. It's going to burn!"
"But it's just a box!" Amelia called. "How can a box have engines?"
The Doctor leapt up onto the edge of the TARDIS. "It's not a box. It's a time machine."
"What, a real one?" Amelia's eyes widened. "You've got a real time machine?"
Adelaide pulled herself up beside the Doctor. It was from their combined effort that the TARDIS was like it was now; the Doctor's disastrous regeneration and her less than advisable piloting abilities. "Not for much longer. She needs to be stabilized."
The Doctor nodded. "Five minute hop into the future should do it."
"Can I come?"
He shook his head. "Not safe in here. Not yet." He paused. "Five minutes. Give us five minutes, we'll be right back."
Amelia frowned. "People always say that."
The Doctor fell off the TARDIS again, moving so that he could crouch in front of Amelia. "Am I people? Do I even look like people? Trust me. I'm the Doctor." He turned and bounced back up into the TARDIS, not even pausing on the edge before falling. "Geronimo!"
There was another splashing noise, and Adelaide was shocked that he'd managed it again. She fell into the closet when she jumped in, but it was nowhere near as far away as the library/swimming pool must have been, given how loud the splash was.
|C-S|
Both Time Lords managed to reach the console before anything bad actually happened to the TARDIS. The Doctor set them for five minutes in the future and then they ran out again, knowing that the TARDIS would need a bit of time to stabilize. He didn't stop as he ran towards the house, but Adelaide did.
They were supposed to jump five minutes…and it was morning.
"Amelia!" the Doctor called, running around the house. "Amelia, I worked out what it was! I know what I was missing! You've got to get out of there!" Adelaide hurried into the house after him, running in just as the Doctor went up the staircase. "Amelia? Amelia, are you all right? Are you there? Prisoner Zero is here! Prisoner Zero is here! Do you understand me? Prisoner Zero is…"
The Doctor went very suddenly silent, and there was a thud. Adelaide looked up the staircase with a frown. She climbed up slowly, only to see a ginger woman ducking into a room. She stayed hidden, waiting until the woman returned dressed in a police uniform and sporting a pair of handcuffs, which she used to secure the unconscious Doctor to the radiator.
The woman waited until the Doctor started to wake up before speaking, somehow not managing to see Adelaide standing where she was at all. "White male, mid-twenties, breaking and entering. Send me some backup. I've got him restrained." The Doctor moved quite violently. "Oi! You, sit still."
The Time Lord frowned. "Cricket bat. I'm getting…cricket back."
"You were breaking and entering."
He grimaced. "Well, that's much better. Brand new me. Whack on the head, just what I needed."
"Do you want to shut up now? I've got back up on the way."
"Hang on, no, wait…you're a policewoman."
She nodded. "And you're breaking and entering. You see how this works?"
"But what are you doing here? Where's Amelia?"
The woman froze. "Amelia Pond?"
"Yeah, Amelia. Little Scottish girl. Where is she? I promised her five minutes but the engines were phasing." He frowned. "I suppose I might have gone a bit far. Has something happened to her?"
"Amelia Pond hasn't lived here in a long time."
"How long?"
"Six months."
The Doctor's eyes widened and he shook his head. "No. No, no, no. I can't be six months late. I said five minutes. I promised. What happened to her? What happened to Amelia Pond?"
The woman turned around and Adelaide backed up down the staircase to stay out of her view. "Sarge, it's me again. Hurry it up. This guy knows something about Amelia Pond."
"I need to speak to whoever lives in this house right now!"
"I live here."
"But you're the police."
She nodded. "Yes, and this is where I live. Have you got a problem with that?"
The Doctor glanced about where Adelaide was standing, and she was quite glad his mind was functioning properly enough to notice that the Time Lady was standing just below the staircase. "How many rooms?"
The woman shook her head. "I'm sorry, what?"
"On this floor. How many rooms on this floor? Count them for me now."
"Why?"
"Because it will change your life."
"Five." The woman pointed to each of them as she numbered them. "One, two, three, four, five."
"Six."
The woman froze. "Six?"
"Look."
"Look where?"
"Exactly where you don't want to look. Where you never want to look. The corner of your eye. Look behind you."
Slowly, the woman turned, finally seeing the door, which Adelaide had just been seeing as she stood on the staircase. "That's…that is not possible. How's that possible?"
"There's a perception filter all-round the door. Sensed it the last time I was here. Should've seen it."
The woman moved towards the door. "But that's a whole room. That's a whole room I've never even noticed."
"The filter stops you noticing. Something came a while ago to hide. It's still hiding, and you need to uncuff me now!"
"I don't have the key," the woman mumbled, moving even closer to the door. "I lost it."
"How can you have lost it?" the Doctor paused, realizing what she was doing. "Stay away from that door! Do not touch that door!" the woman ignored him. "Listen to me, do not open that…" and the woman opened the door. The Doctor sighed. "Why does no-one ever listen to me? Do I have a face that nobody listens to?" he paused. "Again." As he spoke, Adelaide finished climbing the staircase, standing in the doorway. "My screwdriver, where is it? Silver thing, blue at the end. Where did it go?"
"There's nothing here," Amelia called.
"Whatever's there stopped you seeing the room. What makes you think you could see it? Now please, just get out!"
"Silver, blue at the end?"
The Doctor nodded. "My screwdriver, yeah."
"It's here."
"Must have rolled under the door."
"Yeah. Must have." The woman paused. "And then it must have jumped up on the table."
The Doctor and Adelaide met eyes. "Get out of there!" he shouted, pulling on the handcuff. "Get out of there! Get out! Get out of there!" Adelaide tried to look further into the room, but she didn't want to risk getting too close. "What is it? What are you doing?"
"There's nothing here, but…"
"Corner of your eye," the Doctor breathed.
She gasped quietly. "What is it?"
"Don't try to see it. If it knows you've seen it, it will kill you. Don't look at it. Do not look…" the woman screamed. "Get out!"
The woman ran out of the room, stopping when she nearly ran directly into Adelaide. "Two…"
She just pointed at the Doctor. "Screwdriver."
The woman handed it to him and he locked the door before attempting to sonic his handcuffs, though given the fact it wasn't immediately successful Adelaide believed it had broken. "Come on…what's the bad alien done to you?"
"Will that door hold it?"
He rolled his eyes. "Oh, yeah, yeah, of course. It's an interdimensional multiform from outer space. They're all terrified of wood!"
A bright light began to flash behind the door. "What's that? What's it doing?"
The Doctor glanced up, attempting to clean the sonic on his trousers. "I don't know. Getting dressed? Run. Just go. Your back-up's coming. We'll be fine.
"There is no back-up."
He frowned. "I heard you on the radio. You called for back-up."
"Pretend radio?" Adelaide offered, and the woman nodded.
"You're a policewoman!"
"I'm a kiss-o-gram!" the woman pulled off her hat, freeing her ginger hair, just as the door burst open. A man and a large dog stepped out, glaring at the three of them. "But it's just…"
"No, it isn't," the Doctor prompted. "Look at the faces."
The dog began to growl, but it was the man who moved. "What? I'm sorry, but what?"
"One creature disguised as two," Adelaide said, pulling the woman back closer to the Doctor. "Must have done it quickly, the voices are a bit mixed." She frowned. "It would need a psychic link with a dormant mind, a live feed…"
The man growled and opened his mouth to reveal large pointed teeth. "Stay, boy!" the Doctor said. "The three of us, we're safe. Want to know why? She sent for back-up."
The woman sighed. "I didn't send for back-up!"
The Doctor grimaced. "I know. That was a clever lie to save our lives. Okay, yeah, no back-up. And that's why we're safe. Alone, we're not a threat to you. If we had back-up, you'd have to kill us."
"Attention, Prisoner Zero," the Atraxi's voice came from outside. "The human residence is surrounded. Attention Prisoner Zero. The human residence is surrounded."
"What's that?" the woman asked.
"Well, that would be back-up. Okay, one more time. We do have back-up and that's definitely why we're safe."
"Prisoner Zero will vacate the human residence or the human residence will be incinerated."
He shrugged. "Well, safe apart from, you know, incineration."
"Prisoner Zero will vacate the human residence or the human residence will be incinerated."
The Doctor hit the sonic against the ground until it actually make a noise again, letting him finally free himself from the handcuffs. "Run!"
Adelaide led the way back out of the house, the Doctor sonicing the lock closed behind them. "Kiss-o-gram?" he asked.
"Yes, a kiss-o-gram. Work through it."
"Why'd you pretend to be a policewoman?"
"You broke into my house! It was this or a French maid. What's going on? Tell me. Tell me!"
The Doctor ran a hand through his hair. "An alien convict is hiding in your spare room disguised as a man and a dog, and some other aliens are about to incinerate your house. Any questions?"
"Yes."
"Me too." He spun to the TARDIS, attempting to open it, but the key didn't seem to be working. "No, no, no, no! Don't do that, not now!" He sighed. "It's still rebuilding. Not letting us in."
"Prisoner Zero will vacate the human residence or the human residence will be incinerated."
The woman sighed, gesturing for them to follow. "Come on."
However, the Doctor paused. "No, wait, hang on. Wait, wait, wait, wait. The shed." He ran to it. "We destroyed that shed last time we were here. Smashed it to pieces."
The woman shrugged. "So there's a new one. Let's go."
Adelaide shook her head. "That's ten years old, at least."
That prompted the Doctor to actually lick the shed. "Twelve years." They both turned to the woman. "We're not six months late, we're twelve years late."
"He's coming."
"You said six months. Why did you say six months?"
"We've got to go."
"This matters. This is important! Why did you say six months?"
"Why did you say five minutes!" the Time Lords backed up, eyes wide. This was Amelia Pond.
"What?"
Amelia grabbed his arm. "Come on."
"What?"
"Come on!" she managed to make the Doctor move.
"What?"
They ran past the door just as the man and the dog opened the door. "Prisoner Zero will vacate the human residence or the human residence will be incinerated."
Eventually, Amelia let go of the Doctor once it was clear he'd gotten over his shock enough to move on his own, though he was still staring at Amelia with wide eyes. "You're Amelia."
"And you're late."
"Amelia Pond. You're the little girl."
She nodded. "I'm Amelia and you're late."
"What happened?"
"Twelve years."
"You hit me with a cricket bat!"
"Twelve years."
"A cricket bat."
Amelia nodded. "Twelve years and four psychiatrists."
"Four?"
Amelia looked away from them. "I kept biting them."
Adelaide frowned. "Why?"
"They said you weren't real."
"Prisoner Zero will vacate the human residence or the human residence will be incinerated." The Time Lords turned when it appeared that the Atraxi was speaking through a nearby ice cream van.
Amelia sighed as they walked up to the van. "No, no, no, come on. What? We're being staked out by an ice-cream van."
"What's that?" the Doctor asked the man. "Why are you playing that?"
"It's supposed to be Clair de Lune."
The Doctor picked up the radio. "Prisoner Zero will vacate the human residence or the human residence will be incinerated. Repeat. Prisoner Zero will vacate the human residence or the human residence will be incinerated." He lowered the radio, both of them turning to finally realize that literally anything with a speaker was broadcasting the Atraxi's message.
"Doctor, what's happening?"
It took the Doctor a few more seconds before turning and running off down the road again, Amelia and Adelaide following. He leapt over the hedge fence of a home before striding in, making Adelaide sigh. Really, manners.
She may enjoy the running around and investigating, but she still understood the importance of proper manners.
They entered the room as the Doctor was halfway through a sentence. "…also crimes." He ducked behind the old woman's television, which was showing the image of an Atraxi. "Let's have a look."
"I was just about to phone. It's on every channel." The woman turned to see Amelia. "Oh, hello, Amy dear. Are you a policewoman now?"
Amelia shrugged. "Well, sometimes."
"I thought you were a nurse."
"I can be a nurse."
"Or actually a nun?"
"I dabble."
The woman eyed her, but she turned to look at the Doctor and Adelaide again. "Amy, who are your friends?"
The Doctor paused. "Who's Amy? You were Amelia."
"Yeah? Now I'm Amy."
He frowned. "Amelia Pond. That was a great name."
Amy shrugged. "Bit fairy tale."
The woman frowned at the Doctor and Adelaide. "I know you, don't I? I've seen you somewhere before."
The Doctor stepped up to her. "Not me. Brand new face." He stretched his mouth as wide as it could possibly go. "First time on." He frowned at Amy again. "And what sort of job's a kissogram?"
"I go to parties and I kiss people. With outfits. It's a laugh!"
"You were a little girl five minutes ago."
Amy sighed. "You're worse than my aunt."
He shrugged. "I'm the Doctor. I'm worse than everybody's aunt." He grimaced. "And that is not how I'm introducing myself." He soniced the radio and the Atraxi were transmitting the message in every language. "Okay, so it's everywhere, in every language. They're broadcasting to the whole world." He ran out to the window and looked up at the sky.
"What's up there? What are you looking for?"
The Doctor glanced at Adelaide. "Okay. Planet this size, two poles, your basic molten core?" she nodded, knowing they were each working out the specifics. "They're going to need a forty percent fission blast. But they'll have to power up first, won't they? So assuming a medium sized starship…that's twenty minutes." He nodded. "What do you think, twenty minutes? Yeah, twenty minutes. We've got twenty minutes."
"Twenty minutes to what?"
"Are you the Doctor and Addy?" the Time Lords turned to see a man had entered the room.
The woman nodded, smiling. "They are, aren't they? He's the Doctor and she's Addy! The Raggedy Doctor! All those cartoons you did when you were little. The Raggedy Doctor! It's them."
"Shut up," Amy mumbled, but the Time Lords were not quieted.
The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "Cartoons?"
"Gran, it's them, isn't it? It's really them!"
"Jeff, shut up. Twenty minutes to what?"
"The human residence. They're not talking about your house, they're talking about the planet."
Adelaide pointed up. "There's a spaceship up there and it's going to incinerate the planet."
The Doctor nodded. "Twenty minutes to the end of the world." He ran out of the home again, and Adelaide paused long enough to say sorry to the woman before running out of the home.
A/N: The next season has begun! The Time Lords are certainly in for an exciting time together.
As a refresher, I picture Adelaide to look like Felicity Jones.