Another story? I know that those who are reading my other two are cringing at the thought of me starting a new one, but I can't get this out of my head. It probably won't end up being a longer story, but I have a few ideas for it and want to get them out there. It is set during the fourth season, major plot events that happened prior remain the same (Dooomsday, LotTL, etc.). I am a huge 10/Rose fan, and this story will probably reach JE. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: Only in my dreams…
As Martha clung desperately to a railing inside the TARDIS she thought about how she had ended up in this familiar situation. After the Year that Never Was, Martha had been set to leave the Doctor, leave the danger that had the tendency to follow him everywhere, leave him and live a normal life, but when she went back in to explain herself, she couldn't. When she walked back in through those creaky doors, the Doctor had spun around, surprised that she had returned, and she had froze…the Doctor was brilliant, absolutely amazing, but every once in a while she caught a glimpse of the man who was underneath all the quirky comments, bright smiles, and big hair, and that man was just a lonely boy who needed a hand to hold when the darkness crept in. So, she had stayed, all plans of getting out, of living a normal life had vanished with, "One more trip?"
One more trip turned into two more trips. They collided with the TARDIS from another time, they crashed into the Titanic, where Martha had to watch as the Doctor became attached to Astrid, and finally they ended up back in London where she met Donna Noble for the first time.
When the Doctor had insisted that he could investigate Adipose Industries on his own, Martha took the time to visit her family. When she had gotten back to the TARDIS, there was a disgusted looking redhead shouting at the Doctor from inside the TARDIS doors.
"You're not mating with me, Sunshine!"
"A mate, I want a mate".
"Well, just as well, because I'm not having any of that nonsense. I mean, you're just a long streak of nothing, alien nothing."
"There we are then, okay".
"I can come?"
"Yeah, of course you can, yeah. I'd love it," the Doctor ended with a bright smile.
"That's just car keys! I've still got my mum's car keys. I'll only be a minute," Donna assured as she ran off.
The Doctor blinked as she ran off, then scratched his cheek as he assessed how to handle the pile of luggage laying in the alley. He grabbed a few bags and began to make his way into the TARDIS and saw Martha leaning against the side.
"Right," he said, dragging this one word out and looking sheepish.
"What are you up to, Mister?" Martha inquired with a questioning gaze.
"Weeeelll," The Doctor started, "I invited her to come with me, before I met you. Helped her out last Christmas, you know with the whole Christmas star thing, the Christmas star that wasn't a star, but a Racnoss spaceship, the Empress's in fact. You see, the Earth formed around this spaceship, a Racnoss spaceship, that was escaping a war, the Empress wanted to"
"Doctor," Martha interrupted, seeing that he had gone into one of his long-winded explanations.
"Right," the Doctor nodded, "Anyways, I ran into her in Adipose Industries. Turns out that they were breeding on Earth, which is against Galactic Law. Oh, and you would never guess what happens when you put to sonic devices near each other, it's quite"
"Doctor," Martha interrupted again, wanting to know who the mystery person was before she returned.
"Right…again. That is Donna, Donna Noble. She has been looking for me and she wants to travel with me…us. I…well, she doesn't really know about you, but I am sure it would all be fine. You might even like having another girl on board, have someone to talk to about…" the Doctor gestured with his hands as he tried to find the right word, "girly stuff."
Martha took a breath to answer the Doctor's unspoken question, but he kept going.
"I mean, I should have asked you first, that would have been the proper thing to do. Still rude, working on that, at least I know I should have asked you; after all, you are living in the TARDIS as well. I just didn't want to tell her no, she really wants to, and I did tell her she could, even invited her before, but if you really don't want her to, I could…well, I don't know what I could do. It wouldn't be fair to take my invitation back, but at the same time I should have asked you."
"Doctor," Martha broke into his rant, with a laugh, "I don't mind, really. I just was curious as to who she is."
The Doctor nodded, "Good, that's good." He ran his fingers through his hair and gave a theatrical shudder, "Really good, I wouldn't have wanted to be the one to tell her I changed my mind."
When Donna returned to the TARDIS she stepped into the little blue box and smiled at the Doctor, "Off we go then". It was a moment before she noticed Martha sitting on the jump seat.
"You're new," Donna commented, turning to the doctor. "She wasn't here last time, was she?"
The Doctor shook his head, "No, she wasn't. Donna, I'd like to introduce you to Martha Jones. Martha, this is Donna Noble," he ended with a wide grin.
"Hello," Martha said with a smile, hopping off of the jump seat and walking over.
"Hi," Donna said, matching Martha's smile. A thought suddenly clicking in her head as she looked at Martha, "Did you ever find Rose?"
The grin fell off of the Doctor's face, "No, she's…she's still lost."
"Oh," Donna said as way of an apology, noting the way that Martha's face closed off as well. Trying to find a way to bring back that smile of the Doctor's, Donna asked, "So, are you going to show me the universe or not, Martian boy?"
"Where would you like to go?" The Doctor asked, left hand clutching a lever and his right hand holding a mallet. "And Donna," he added with a small smile, "still not from Mars".
It had been two weeks since they had left Pompeii and the only time that Donna and Martha had seen the Doctor was when he appeared out of a hallway to check the status of the TARDIS, then disappeared again. Immediately after they had dropped Evalina and her family off, the Doctor had put them adrift in the Vortex and had taken to ignoring them.
In their downtime, Martha and Donna had grown quite fond of each other, and were sitting in the kitchen when the inevitable topic of the Doctor came up.
"Does he do this often?" Donna asked, in reference to the Doctor just leaving them floating around space while he wandered off and did…whatever it was he was doing.
"Not since I've been onboard," Martha replied. "He would sometimes get a little…but, it was only for a few seconds, never like this."
Donna looked around, making sure that the Doctor hadn't all of a sudden appeared in the kitchen, "When I first met, the Doctor, he told me that he had lost someone named Rose. Do you know anything about her?"
Donna felt bad for prying, but she couldn't help it. Every time she was mentioned a look of pain would cross the Doctor's face, and every once in a while she would see his eyes gaze over as if he were lost in a memory.
"I don't know a lot about her, really. She was from London, 21st century, and she traveled with the Doctor for around two years. There was one time that the Doctor had sent her home in the TARDIS, but she returned, saved his life and he ended up regenerating; I'm still having trouble with that whole idea. I don't really know anything about their time together other than that, but he obviously cares for her a lot and I have to imagine she felt the same way about him."
"How'd she 'get lost'?" Donna asked, using the term that the Doctor had.
"She got trapped in a parallel world and the Doctor can't get her back out…sure he's tried though," Martha added on wistfully, wishing the Doctor would care that much about her. After the Year that Never Was, Martha had abandoned the hopes that the Doctor would ever return her affections, but that didn't stop her from wanting to be closer to him, as friends. It always felt like there was something holding the Doctor back, like he didn't want to be that close to her, or anyone, didn't want to rely on them in any way.
"What are you doing?" A voice asked before Donna could comment.
Both Donna and Martha whipped around to see an angry Doctor glaring at them.
"We were just tal…"
"I don't bring humans along so they can sit around and gossip, if you want to do that then I can just drop you off on the nearest planet," the Doctor spat out, his temper getting the better of him. He had been walking past the kitchen when he heard his two companions talking, hoping to get things back to normal, he had stopped to ask them where they wanted to go next, when he heard Donna mention Rose. He knew he should have just walked away, but he couldn't pull himself away, not even the TARDIS's soft hum could lure him to leave.
"Why do you bring us along then?" Donna snapped, falling back on her quips because she didn't know how else to react. "For the past two weeks it has seemed like you don't even want us around. You said you wanted a mate, but I think you've forgotten how to have friends. I'll give you some advice, you don't usually stick them in outer space for two weeks, in a little blue box, and then threaten to leave them somewhere!"
The Doctor clenched his teeth together as he stared at Donna; half of him wanted to pull her into a hug and apologize and the other half wanted to make good on his promise. He compromised by turning on his heel and rapidly exiting the kitchen, disappearing once again into the depths of the TARDIS.
Donna heaved out a breath and looked at Martha, who's mouth had gone slack during their exchange. "I didn't mean to say that," Donna informed softly, "I shouldn't have said that."
"It's…" Martha began, "He'll…" she tried again, "When he comes out you can just apologize, I'm sure he will understand."
"Yeah, maybe," Donna replied, "or maybe he will throw me out of the TARDIS."
"He wouldn't do that," Martha assured, even though she wasn't so sure about it. "Why don't we go watch a movie, relax a little and take our minds off of this?"
Donna nodded and the two made their way into the mini theatre that the TARDIS provided for them. "You can pick out the movie," Donna said as she grabbed a bin of popcorn out of the already full popcorn machine.
Martha walked over to the console that had a touch screen of any movie they could ever want to see, but all she could see was one movie titled, The Stuff of Legends. "Um," she said looking over at Donna, "there is only one movie."
"What do you mean 'one movie'? The TARDIS has all movies".
"Not this time," Martha told her.
"Well, put it on, maybe the old girl just knows what we want to watch".
Martha selected the movie and sat down in the chair next to Donna, reaching her hand into the bin and grabbed a few pieces of popcorn.
"Oi! Get your own," Donna griped.
"No, the movie's about to start," Martha complained back.
"It's right over there," Donna said pointing to the machine.
"Why can't you just share some of yours?" Martha asked, trying to steal a piece.
"Because it's mine," Donna explained, holding the bucket away from Martha.
"Actually, it's the TAR…"
"Is this thing on?" A male voice could be heard asking over the speakers, a voice that Martha recognized instantly.
"No, it can't be…" Martha said, freezing her attempts to get some popcorn.
"Can't be what?" Donna asked.
"Ah, there we go," the voice was no longer disembodied, but came attached to a very handsome man.
"Who is that?" Donna asked, all of a sudden interested in the movie.
"Shh," Martha hushed her.
The man in the video smiled flirtatiously, "For those of you who don't know me, and honestly, who doesn't? My name is Captain Jack Harkness, and I am sure whoever is watching this wants to know more about me, after all, who wouldn't?"
"Oi, Pretty Boy!" called another voice called from off screen.
"I prefer, Captain," Jack replied, looking in the direction of the voice.
"And I would prefer it if you didn't go rifling through my stuff, but we can't always get what we want, now can we?" The northern accented voice responded.
"Oh, leave 'im alone, he's just messing around, no harm done…Right? I mean, that's just a video camera, yeah. It isn't going to blow up a planet or somethin'?"
"We are in for a treat today, boys and girls," Jack whispered to the camera, in a mock documentary voice, "for right now there is about to be some interaction between the two most stubborn people in the universe. Let's watch," he ended, spinning the camera around to focus on a young blond and a man with dark brown hair, bright blue eyes, sporting a pair of large ears.
"No, it isn't going to blow up a planet," the man said derisively, "but, that doesn't mean I want him to have it."
"I'm right here," Jack's said from behind the camera.
"I know, can't get rid of you".
"Doctor, play nice," the blond reprimanded, playfully slapping the Doctor's arm.
"I am playing nice, Rose. I didn't let him blow up, did I?"
The video faded out, leaving Donna and Martha in the dim light. They turned towards each other and exclaimed at the same time.
"That's Rose!"
"That's the Doctor!"
"And who is Jack?" Donna ended.
Worth continuing?