Dear all,

I'm guessing most of the people reading this also read The Music of the Ainur. For the benefit of those - I'm taking a short break from that to plan my next assault. While that happens, please enjoy this little thing I'm throwing together.

- Philip

The Time of the Ancient Mariner

Prologue

"You won't make it," Clara said.

"A fortnight? Please," the Doctor scoffed, wedging the handset under his cheek as he patted his pockets down. "A sneeze to a Time Lord. I've lost fortnights on accident before – decades, in fact. And, on at least one occasion, a yesterday," he said, pulling his sonic screwdriver from his pocket and running it along the TARDIS console.

"No," Clara retorted, "No, this is you, so I guarantee that the moment I hang up some kind of…spacey-wacey hyper-crisis is going to fall into your lap and I'll be getting frantic calls between piña coladas."

"Hyper-crisis," the Doctor muttered dismissively. "You do have an imagination, you know; 99% of the time, the universe just gets on with getting on, to listen to you you'd think it was an action movie."

"Then how comes," Clara asked, "it always seems to be so when I'm with you?"

"You only see the highlights," the Doctor mumbled in response as he flicked impatiently between sonic settings. "The greatest hits. You're good to have around in a pinch - you seem to have a way of inspiring good ideas; you're the brick wall for the echo."

"Brick wall," Clara deadpanned. "Charming. I suppose it's better than-"

"I told you," the Doctor interjected, lowering his voice, "I didn't realise that's what it meant."

"Neither did the Mayoress," Clara replied. "The children were more than happy to explain it to her, though. In detail."

"Well, I think that's more than enough goodbyeing," The Doctor announced loudly before Clara could finish speaking. "I don't want to keep you and P.E. waiting."

"Maths teacher," Clara repeatedly, boredly, for the ninth time that month.

"Why a P.E. teacher would be interested in roads in the first place, I've no idea," the Doctor continued unheeding, wrapping the handset's cord around his chest as he turned this way and that, tending to the TARDIS' circuits. "Far too linear and that. Not violent enough, either, they just…go," he mumbled, almost to himself.

Clara paused. "No, Rhodes!" she replied. "The island, in Greece!"

"Oh!" the Doctor replied, spinning to free himself from the tangled cord. "Did I ever tell you of the time I ran into an Auton there? Massive, he was – no idea how – but he'd managed to pass himself off as a-"

A bustle of voices and activity down the line cut the Doctor short, before Clara came back. "Taxi's here," she said in the secretive voice she used when Danny was around. "See you soon."

"Enjoy your boring planet," the Doctor replied.

"Two days," Clara whispered. "I'm calling it. You'll last two days, spaceman."

"A lot can happen in two days!" The Doctor called down the phone, frowning as the line suddenly went dead. "I asked her," he said to the phone, "I said, why holiday on your own planet when you can see the crystal waterfalls of Ferula? But no, apparently P.E. 'wouldn't like that'! Humans," he sighed as he stretched to replace the handset.

Without warning, the TARDIS lurched violently and sent him sprawling across the console, digging his heels into the grille to keep him from falling any further. Alarms and sirens blared, and the soft lighting became harsh and red.

"What? What is it now?" he called out as he righted himself, swinging a screen towards him as he wrapped his other arm around a rail. His bushy eyebrows rose dramatically as he saw his place in time tearing backwards at an alarming rate. "Eh? What do you think you're playing at?" he asked the screen angrily, flicking and poking it like a tired beast of burden. The numbers, however, told no lie; they were tumbling down the vortex, screaming into the primordial past.

"No, no, no!" the Doctor cried out as he furiously jabbed at buttons, trying to get the TARDIS back under control. "I've told you, you can't be flying off on your own like this, it's very bad for my trust issues!" The numbers on the screen flew further and further backwards, while the Doctor ran unsteadily around the console, pulling out every stop he could find. "Ah, Daleks," he muttered, giving up on trying to arrest the TARDIS' flight and instead crawling beneath the console and bracing himself for the inevitable.

Touchdown, however, was surprisingly gentle, and the Doctor – after a quick check to make sure he had the right number of fingers – slid out of his hiding place, dusting himself down. "Are you quite finished?" he said grumpily.

Despite his sarcasm, the silence unnerved him deeply. The usual "resting" thrum of the TARDIS was gone, leaving behind an eerie stillness broken only by the clunk and thunk of the cooling systems.

"Oh, come on," the Doctor chastised his vessel, pumping a lever energetically, "you can't be that tired! You've only gone-" he choked as he swung the screen towards him. "-seven billion years?!" He blurted, whizzing the sonic across the screen. The numbers remained unchanged. His face set like plaster, hard and serious. "That's the when," he said to himself, pressing buttons, "but where are we?"

NO RECORD, the screen flashed.

"Oh, now you're just being unfair!" The Doctor cried out to the heavens. He eyed the door suspiciously; with no sensors online, there was no way to know if the outside world was dangerous or not.

"Seven billion years ago," he muttered as he inched closer to the door. "Early phase of life in the universe. Lots of habitable worlds, young worlds, full of energy and oxygen, and…leeches the size of mountains," he trailed off. He glanced back to the TARDIS console, its central dome rising and falling gently, like the breathing of a sleeper. It steeled his resolve. "If you've brought me somewhere you can't get back from," he addressed his ship, straightening his cuffs, "you must have had a good reason." He walked to the door and gripped the handle, breathing deeply before pushing it open to stride out into a wall of arrows.

A dozen tall, slender figures in golden helmets and finely-pattered armour which had once been gold, but now was battered and tarnished with blood, mud and filth, stood in a semi-circle around the door with tall bows nocked and aimed at him. Their eyes, bright and starry, stared through him as though he was already dead – or, possibly, they were.

"Oh…hello," he said. One, sharp-faced and unarmed, stepped forward and addressed him. Definitely an officer, the Doctor thought.

"Man esselya ná?" He said. The Doctor's eye twitched in surprise.

"I…what?" he spluttered. "What language is that?"

"Man cárat?" The tall, angry-looking officer asked, more forcefully than before. The sound of tightening bowstrings was deafening over the silence. The Doctor's brows furrowed before he broke into a wide smile.

"'Scuse me," he whispered before turning back into the TARDIS. "Oi!" He called out. "Sort it out!" He turned back to find the bowmen regarding him with suspicious and intimidated looks. "Sorry about that," he said, leaning casually on the lintel. "Translation circuits must be offline. Happens, sometimes, after a big journey – they'll be back any second now."

"Man cárnet?" the officer asked, his brow knotted in confusion, pointing back into the TARDIS.

"Oh, that?" The Doctor replied, pointing back himself. The officer nodded. "That's the TARDIS. It's my ship. It brought me here, though I don't know how…she does that," he trailed off as he saw his adversary's face darkening with impatience.

"Man name ná?"

The Doctor's eyebrows rose. "Oh…oh, now we're getting somewhere!" The gentleman's stern expression melted into surprise as he heard a word he recognised. "Yes! Yes, you understand me now, don't you? Oh, you beauty!" He called back into the TARDIS as the bowmen looked between each other, unnerved.

"Man es going on?" one of them muttered to another. "Má did he start talking Eldarin?"

"Eldarin, eh?" The Doctor said, walking slowly towards the officer with the points of the arrows following his movement perfectly. "Can't say I've heard of that. But that's good, that's good; I do love a challenge," he said, his eyes drifting to where the officer's hand rested tightly on the hilt of his sword. "Who are you?"

The officer's face was still yet seething. The Doctor's gaze was held tight by bright blue eyes that seemed almost as old as his own. "I am Galdor of Gondolin," he said, his grip on his sword loosening imperceptibly. "And you?"

"Me?" The Doctor replied. "I'm the Doctor."