Vworp vworp vworp. Thuom.

"And here we are! Out side that door, is Ireland, 800 AD, just 5 years after the Viking Norsemen started invading. You should fit right in."

"I know, dark red hair. But are you serious? We're back in time, just like that?"

The Doctor put his hands in his pockets and grinned, his eyebrows rising. "Just like that. Why don't you go take a look?"

Kathryn Moore, usually called Katie, glanced towards the door of the TARDIS. It was her first voluntary trip with the Doctor, her first having started with a sudden transport when she was attacked by aliens on Earth. In the end, she had helped to save an entire race from a slow, painful death, but she had also discovered her clone roots.

She looked back at the Doctor, her mind returning to the present moment. "But this time is past for me. It's not like when you go forward; that's the same as living. This happened and is gone. It's finished, over, never to happen again." Her face became the definition of wonder and exhilaration. "And I get to see it!" She dashed to the door and flung it open.

Katie had only ever lived in one place all her life. She had been to different states, but all those places were hot and muggy and windless, and she was never really pleased with it. She longed for mists and rain and ocean and green land and cold air and moonlight. Now, for the first time, she finally got what she wanted.

She was standing in a clearing in a pine forest. The grass was thick, and the kind of green that only comes naturally. It seemed to be very early morning; the still-bright stars were surrounded by a blackness that was just starting to turn gray. Mist wound its way through the trees, creating veils for them and playing with the dieing moonbeams. Somewhere in the woods, she heard a stream dancing its way along rocks. Nothing stirred as Katie breathed in the scent of wet earth, drank in the cold air, and let herself drown in the sights. Everything was peaceful, perfect.

"Oh that's beautiful! Look at this place! Take us a bit of doing to find anyone, but it's still gorgeous."

"And then you had to ruin it." Katie turned to glare at the Doctor. He was adjusting the color of a brown trench coat he had put on over his dark blue pinstripe suit. "Do you ever stop talking?"

The Doctor seemed slightly miffed. "You shouldn't be saying anything, you talk quite a bit yourself."

"I talk? Have you ever listened to you? You talk more then a talking…thing!"

He turned away, looking for all the world like a five-year old being told he couldn't have candy before dinner. "Not my fault I'm brilliant. I don't choose to have important things to say."

"Important?" Katie laughed. "Right, everything you say is terribly important, like when I was choosing a room and you told me that you had counted the seeds in a banana once and forgot to write it down."

"I only mentioned that because you found my banana tree."

"Exactly! Who has a banana tree growing in a spare bedroom?"

"Well, the same kind of person who has a pool in the library."

That piece of information made Katie pause. "You have a pool. You have a pool…in your library?"

The Doctor flashed a grin that seemed to be tailor made to fit his face. "Yes I do."

The two of them started laughing, adding the sound of their companionship to the dawn chorus.

When they stopped, Katie stood up straight. "Now then. How about we go look for someone? No point going to different times if you never talk to anybody." She started walking off, almost skipping. If she was going to live to be 1000, why not have fun while she was still young? She spun around, still bouncing. "Come on Doctor, you can't be that stuffy. 903 years-ack!"

"Kathryn!" The Doctor ran forward, looking down just in time to see Katie tumbling head over heals down a steep hillside, omitting small (and somehow sarcastic) sounds of pain as she rolled.


When Katie finally stopped, the first thing she noticed was an oddly familiar sound. She opened her eyes, and her suspicions were confirmed when she found herself staring into the wooly face of a ewe. "Okay, sheep. I can deal with sheep." She gingerly wiggled her fingers and toes, relieved to find them still responding. "At least my back isn't broken." She groaned. "Though it sure feels that way."

Sitting up, she starting checking herself to see if anything else was damaged. Fortunately, besides a gash on her forehead, a nasty cut on her arm, and a sore ankle, it was just scrapes and bruises. She smiled and turned to the sheep that were watching her. "Shouldn't take me too long. Now, how about we see how well I can do this?"

She closed her eyes, but instead of darkness, she saw the landscape. This time, however, it was painted in swirling colors. Everything around her was a very light red, almost yellow. "Of course, light energy won't really be present, it's still early. No help from there." As she spoke, she saw the blue flashes of sound energy from her mouth danced up and out, moving to join the plaintive calls of the sheep. "That's right, sound! But that's not enough. What else do I have?" Searching the landscape with her mind's eye, she noticed that the sheep were a sickly lime green. "There goes heat. But that's the most brain waves I've ever seen! No wonder sheep are so stupid. All that mental energy just comes pouring out. They have no way to retain it."

When Katie had first met the Doctor, she had discovered that, not only was she a clone and an alien, but she could absorb energy as well. Everyone did it; that's how people saw, heard, thought, moved, everything. But for unknown reasons, Katie had been designed to absorb and store the extra energy, or "breath of the universe", as someone had once called it. Whenever she was injured, her body used the energy she stored to heal her. However, if she paused to focus, she could draw in the energy around her even faster and use it to fix whatever was damaged.

This is what she did now. Sitting very still, she pictured all the brain waves of the sheep, and the sounds they were making, becoming a ball of energy in front of her, but not being absorbed. Using her now very sore head, she imagined the energy ball moving down to her ankle. Just as she felt it start to work with an odd tingle-

"Who is that? If ye be trying tae make off wi' the sheep, it wull nae wark!"

Katie's concentration was broken by a thickly accented voice. "Men." She said under her breath. "Last time it was the Doctor. Now some Scottish bloke is inter-" She paused. Scottish? she thought. I thought we were in Ireland.

"I'm talking tae ye! Who- Och, lass, what ye be doing here?"

She turned to look at him, struggling to stand. She appeared rather annoyed. "I was out for a morning stroll, and decided to fall over a hill and roll down to the bottom. Much faster that way."

The man chuckled. He was tall, with broad shoulders. His hair and eyes were dark and his face shaven. From his breeches and shirt, Katie figured she must be somewhere in the mid 18th century. "Nae need tae get sae worked up, miss. Whar ye from?"

"Nowhere, soon to be everywhere." She snapped back, irritated she had been disturbed. She was still trying to pull herself up using a large boulder she had nearly crashed into on the way down. The man half-smiled and bent down to help her up.

"You luk like ye could use a hand, miss." She reached up and grabbed his bare hand. An electrifying jolt forced them to both let go. Katie felt the cut on her arm start to close as the man stepped back, his eyes wide.

"Wha was that?"

Katie knew what it was. She had just pulled energy out of the young man into her. But how was she supposed to explain it? I'll have to be sure not to touch anyone, she thought.

"Kathryn!" She gave a quiet sigh of relief. The Doctor had arrived. The perfect distraction.

"I'm over here Doctor!"

He was coming down the hill as quickly as he could, moving sideways so he didn't start rolling the way Katie had done. "You alright?"

"A few bruises, a couple of cuts, a sore ankle, a man from the 18th century that sounds Scottish…other than that, yeah, I'm fine."

He pulled up short. He looked from the man, who was now staring at them both, to Katie. "We're in Scotland?"

Katie, who by now had finished standing up and was leaning on the boulder, glared at him. "Yeah, Scotland. Middle of the 18th century. You said we were in-"

The Doctor cleared his throat, cutting her off. Moving effortlessly into a Scottish brogue, he admonished her. "Kathryn, I think that bump on your head temporarily addled your mind. You've certainly forgotten your manners." He turned to the man and held out his hand, that grin on his face again. "Hello, I'm the Doctor. This is Kathryn Moore. I must apologize for her rudeness. She wasn't raised as well as some."

"Now look here-!"

The man shook his head and took the Doctor's hand, smiling. "Nae trouble at a'. It isn't every day ye find a bonny lass in the middle of yer flock. Maun be because of the day. Name's Liam Hastings. I wark for the Dixon family. 'Tis their land ye stumbled across."

"Excuse me, did you say Dixon?"

"That I did."

The Doctor peered at nothing, muttering to himself. "Dixon. I've heard that name before. Dixon."

Katie snorted gently, then asked, "What's today?"

Liam laughed. "Ye maun of both lived in the woods for quite a while. 'Tis May day, and the Dixon's wull be sore pleased tae have mair guests. Fallow me, strangers. Though, I think ye should have yer faither be the one tae help ye. Mistress Dixon wull hae something tae treat yer wounds."

"Yes. Quite. We'll catch up in a moment," the Doctor said, pulling himself back to the moment.

He turned to Katie, who by now was fuming. "He thinks I'm your daughter? I don't even look like you! Or sound like you. How did you change your accent so fast anyway? And why are we here instead of Ireland? You promised me Ireland."

"If you keep overreacting this way, I'm going to lock you in King Tut's tomb. Just breathe, and be happy we're here."

Katie closed her eyes, inhaling deeply. When she opened them again, she had an apologetic look on her face. "I'm sorry Doctor. Long day. Now, help me up, and we'll figure out what we're supposed to tell them as a back story. I haven't actually named a hometown yet, so we're still good there. I don't look like you, so we could say you adopted me, perhaps? You found me while you were traveling and let me come with you."

The Doctor bobbed his head in agreement. "Mneh, it's the truth, at least. Works for me." He looked at her askance. "Just be sure you don't go pulling that dagger out on anyone."

She glanced down at her belt where her Grixzen dagger was. She had used it to kill the last person who attacked her. "As long as you don't go offering me in marriage, '"Dad"', it will stay right where it is. I still have one question though."

"And that would be..."

"Why are we here instead of where you said we were going?"

"I don't know. I'll have to ask the TARDIS when we get back."

Katie gasped. "I knew it! She is alive! I thought I felt something different about her, but I figured it was the time-travel stuff. How do you talk to her?"

"I just talk. She tells me what she wants through emotions." The Doctor seemed distracted. His forehead was wrinkled slightly, as though he was trying to find something in his mind. "Dixon. I feel like I should know that one."

Katie playfully shoved him and grinned. "Oh, stop worrying about it! We're going to a May day celebration!"


*Constructive critisisim welcome, praise happily accepted, flames not wanted*