Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who or any of it's other Trademarks.
The doctor took off in his Tardis, but this time with a little less vigour and excitement than usual. He sighed a little. He had always liked the idea of Christmas, but never really got into the whole swing of it. As the Tardis heaved into movement, probably leaving Donna a little worse for wear, he considered where he'd go next. The first place that sprung to mind was Castrovalva, it had been a good place to think in the past.
'If my thought's are anything like the architecture I'll probably end up going on circles.'
He stopped again, leaning on a large lever on the Tardis console.
'Maybe… Trakken…' then he paused, remembering what events that happened there and flicked the lever down. 'Maybe…not…'
"The eye of Orion…mmm too predictable." The tenth Doctor decided not.
After a few moments of cataloguing all the places he could go, he sighed again.
"Why don't you tell me where to go? Hmm?" The doctor looked at the Tardis disagreeably. "You usually do!" he then give her a bit of a bang on the console.
He stopped… with a degree of concern… he was fully aware that he hadn't 'hmmmed' at the Tardis for at least 5 regenerations, possibly 10.
"…Oh dear…" he did it again… that was about 9 ago…
"I'm sorry old gi-…" he then rolled his eyes at the ridiculous statement he had just said, and he hadn't said that one for about 8 or 7 regenerations.
"This is just ridiculous…" he paused, to check he was saying something typical of one of his older regenerations. Luckily, it didn't.
"Well that was weird." He thought for a moment, with his brow furrowed in deep thought.
He decided that he would probably go to Terra Alpha… the place where sadness is illegal. He dashed around the console in a frenzied rush to enter the co-ordinates, and make sure that all the Tardis was in check, just as he was about to press down the lever, something dawned on him. For one of the first times… he felt uncharacteristically lonely. He slowly released the lever and the Tardis began to whurr and creak slightly. The sound of the Tardis almost reinforced the Doctor's feeling.
"We're getting old now aren't we?" he said patting the wall. He thought he'd look around the Tardis. See if anything new had materialized since the last time he looked. To be honest, Rose occupied a lot of his time,
'Rose…' he thought for a moment. Then blinked again and began to 'la' 'Kiss from a Rose' by Seal, Unfortunately he wasn't doing a very good job of it.
"Maybe I should go to a doctor's and get my vocal's checked…" he thought clutching his throat.
Suddenly, he Tardis jolted untimely. "Better!" he shouted to the Tardis, like a little school boy. He dashed over to the console. And began to fiddled around with all the controls. "No… it can't possibly be…But why?!"
"I wouldn't worry sweetheart." Jackie said, "I'm sure he'll be fine." She answered to Rose, who had been fretting about the Doctor since he's disappeared off the beach.
"But you don't know what he's like Mum." She answered. "He's just useless on his own."
"Listen Rose." Her father said sternly. "You're not his life-line he coped without you…"
"He has a point Rose." Mickey answered. "Stop stressing…"
Rose sighed, one of the advantages about this parallel dimension was that her dad was very rich, quite a shock from Rose's every day life. She threw herself onto the couch and lulled her head back. "Back to the slow path…"
"You what?" Jackie asked, as she was making a hot cup of Tea.
"Noffin…" Rose answered, with an extremely London accent.
"We not havin' any 'noffin's in my house… were upper class now Rose."
"Dad!" she moaned.
"I mean it, you too Jackie."
"Whaddya mean you too Jackie?!" she answered furiously. Mickey noticed that Pete obviously hadn't been with women for a long while.
"Nothing sweetheart…" he answered, looking slightly intimidated.
Rose looked board. "Is this it now? My dad and my mum arguing… God."
But then she heard something, a familiar sound, a sound she could recognise from a mile away. "Oh my God."
She sprang into action and ran out of the house.
"Rose!" Mickey shouted, running after her.
Pete quickly tried to follow.
"OYE! WHERE D'YA FINK YOU'RE GOING?!" Jackie shouted.
"No where…" he smiled nervously.
"Good!"
"But I can't be here!" the doctor exclaimed. "That would mean that a trans-dimensional vortex must have brought me here… but that shouldn't happen…" The doctor was madly excited. Something strange and unusual had happened, just at the right time. "I'm in another dimension!... Yes! I could-" he suddenly heard a loud knocking on the door.
"DOCTOR! DOCTOR! ARE YOU THERE?!?!?"
"Rose?!?!?!?" The doctor sounded ecstatic. He opened the door and ran out with such a tremendous energy that it was infectious. He saw her there, the same as he had left her on the beach, the same look, the same hair… the same everything, the Rose he remembered.
"Doctor…" she was so shocked, she didn't know what to say.
"But…" he looked at the Tardis. "How did you bring me here?" he asked. "You're not supposed to cross dimensions… or universes…" He talked to the Tardis like it was a living object.
"Doctor for goodness sake!" Rose clamped herself onto him, he turned around quickly to receive her hug. "I've missed you."
"Oh come on Rose, it's only been a day or two… hasn't it?" The doctor asked.
She nodded her head. The doctor gazed into her eyes for a second, and then looked away, seeing Rose's rather lavish and rich abode. "So… shall I call you Madame de Tyler… or-"
"Just, Rose…" she smiled, still looking in his eyes. She went slightly closer to him and closer and…
"For God's sake… if you're going to kiss… a least don't let me see it." Mickey answered, looking away, trying to avert his gaze.
"Mickey!" The doctor smiled "I've never ever ever ever ever been so glad to see you." He said, with an excited smile.
Mickey had to admit, he did like this Doctor better, he wasn't half as grouchy as the old one, who use to call him Rickey, Thickey, Mickey, Lickey, idiot and any other name he could think of. In fact, this doctor actually liked Mickey.
"Well… err maybe you'd better come i-" Mickey was about to start to say, until all of them turned around.
The Tardis started to make noise again… but it wasn't de-materialising it was materialising again. The doctor slowly turned around…
"That's not supposed to happen…" he stood absolutely still as he watched the top of the Tardis flashing, it slowly died down…
"Doctor what's going on?" Rose held onto his arm.
The Doctor was stood with his hands in his pockets, star-struck.
The door creaked open and suddenly a man came out, wearing a tired looking leather jacket, a black jumper and quite a puzzled look on his face, he then had a flicker of recognition in his eyes.
"Rose?" he gasped.
"Doctor?!" she exclaimed surprised.
"WHAT?!" The tenth doctor exclaimed horrified.
"This is twisted man." Mickey commented, with a slight grin on his face.
"What do you mean?!" Rose said gob-smacked. "There's two doctors!"
"Yeah I noticed…" Mickey answered.
Both the doctors eyed each other up, trying the size the other's character and traits.
"I'm guessing your number ten?" The ninth doctor said, his northern accent thick and quite dull to the ear. He seemed to be looking in deep concentration.
"Yes… and you're…number nine." The tenth doctor answered "You're older looking than I remembered… I looked old… really old." He looked at himself with a mocked concern. "But don't worry give me time and I'm sure I'll get use to it."
"Oh thanks." The ninth answered.
"What…how can you both be here at the same time?" Mickey asked.
"It should be impossible…" The ninth doctor added, folding his arms.
"Well I say impossible… but it's happened… about three times before now…Well I say three… I only remember three… I might have met myself countless times before that and usually-" the tenth doctor continued to babble, looking up at the sky.
"But usually…they've brought us together..." The ninth doctor looked less serious for a moment and asked Rose quietly "Does he always go on like this?" The ninth asked, watching his other regeneration, happily talking to himself.
"Yeah… he kinda rambles…" Rose smiled.
"I wasn't this bad was I?" the ninth doctor asked.
"No…" Rose smiled, Rose's hand brushed against the ninth doctor's.
"Yes," the tenth answered. Both Rose and the ninth doctor looked at the tenth once he had finished his speech, looking deadly serious, an extreme mood swing from his happy chatty self. "Usually the Time lords are involved… but that's not possible…"
Both Doctor's looked quite serious now. "Now…why would we have been brought together?"
"We need to think over this…" the ninth doctor pondered. "With a nice cup of char." He smiled. "You do still have char don't you?"
"A cup of Char? Ashes and that…" Mickey said. "That'd be gross."
"Tea… Dickey… Tea." The ninth doctor answered, deliberately not using his real name.
"You two got along better than I remembered…" the tenth doctor said with a degree of surprise.
"You could say that." Mickey scowled at the ninth doctor, who looked perfectly amiable.
"You could say we hated each other." The ninth doctor smiled sarcastically.
In order to stop the awkward silence between them the tenth doctor interjected with a useless factoid
"Did you know that Britain has consumed 157,300,090 cups of tea so far today?"
"And how do you know that?" Mickey asked,
"You'd be surprised what you learn
on… he answered. Mickey smiled. "I'll have to check it out."
"It a real eye opener…" the tenth doctor answered.
"Well it is pretty late," Rose looked at her watch it was 22.53 "You wanna both come in for a cup of tea?"
"I'd love to." The tenth doctor took Rose's hand and walked towards the house with her. The ninth doctor looked peeved as he followed them both.
"Oooo look at that." Mickey smiled smugly, walking next to him. "Now there's two of you chasing after her? I think she likes him better."
"Shut up Vicky."
"That's a girl's name." Mickey smirked.
"Yeah… I know." The ninth doctor answered. "And don't get any funny ideas… I'm not asking you out."
They all entered the house. "Well you've certainly gone up market…" the ninth doctor looked around the wealthy looking house.
"Well…" the tenth doctor interjected.
The tenth doctor suddenly began to look slightly nervous. Realizing that his early regeneration might be the slightest bit annoyed with him swapping the Tyler family into the other dimension and all… 'Seems like a moody one this one'
"Doctor?!" Pete said, with a degree of shock.
"Oh God not 'im!" Jackie pointed at the ninth.
"Pete… Tyler…" The ninth doctor looked at his younger re-generation, who conveniently decided to look up at the ceiling.
"It's very nice this ceiling you know…The details-"
"YOU!..." The ninth doctor shouted, looking at the tenth sternly. "YOU'VE MANAGED TO COCK UP THE TIME LINE TO EPIC PROPORTIONS! I REALLY TAKE MY HAT OFF TO YOU... PETE TYLER IS MEANT TO BE-"
"Aye I'm here you know!" Pete spoke up.
"It's not me!" the tenth shouted back with just as much conviction. "It's stupid Torchwood…And stupid 'let's puncher time and see what happens." The tenth defended his actions, and articulated every single word perfectly, unlike his northern counterpart, who seemed to be yelling in a dull angry blur.
"You know I think the moon should have a sign you know that says 'I'm with stupid' pointing at planet earth…" he paused for a moment and then sighed. "Stupid human beings! You're like children… you say don't touch and the next thing you know…" the ninth doctor said.
"I'm cleaning up the mess." The tenth finished.
"Again." They both added simultaneously.
Mickey, Pete, Jackie and Rose looked shocked, like they'd been given a good telling off. The ninth and tenth looked at each other and then both looked down for a moment, both slightly embarrassed of the other.
"So… how about that tea?" The ninth doctor said hopefully.
"Sorry stupid humans only." Jackie added spitefully. "And 'im." She pointed at the tenth. Who smiled and winked
"Go on cocker." He said to Jackie.
"Why not me?" The ninth said, "He was as bad as me!"
"You're rude." The tenth answered, looking with a cheeky disapproval.
"What?!" the ninth frowned. Looking the farthest from cheeky than alienly possible.
"Very rude…" The tenth doctor added. "So… cup of tea."
