A/N: Hi everyone! Finally back! Sorry for the wait; I hope you haven't all forgotten me by now hehe. Wales and England were fantastic, though – I'm now seriously convinced that there's a little flat in Cardiff with my name on it, soon as I get the money to pay for it : - ). (Really, nothing against my own country, but you guys in Wales and England have wonderful section of the world over there!)

Anyway, welcome back to the story, and thanks more than ever for sticking with it if you've chosen to read this : - ). Hope you enjoy!!

Entry #32

It is officially very frustrating that I can't bring my diary with me when going on adventures. (Even the times that I do bring my purse with me, my diary doesn't fit inside.) Because, sometimes, these adventures are rather long and drawn out, and it would be nice to be able to write things as they happen, instead of having to write an extremely detailed outline just to make sure I don't miss anything when I finally get to my diary! Even with said outline, though, I'm sure I'm going to miss something from this last outing. Some little quip that was funny – there were a lot of those – or some interesting observation… Ah, well. I've given it my best shot, and I've shaken out my right arm so it will be all prepared for a very long writing session. Here goes…

It all started… Oh, I'm not even going to attempt to reconcile Earth-time with TARDIS time, now, but it started one morning not too incredibly long ago but not, like, yesterday, either. I'd just finished getting dressed and ready for the "day" when, with a shaky phwump, the TARDIS materialized at our latest landing site. (Thankfully, my make-up was already applied, or I may have looked like a modern-art painting.)

"Oh, this is brilliant!" I heard the Doctor cheer from outside the doors of the TARDIS shortly after landing.

I smiled to myself as I walked down the hall from my room to meet the Doctor. I was so glad that the Doctor was really starting to seem like his old self again – the (completely understandable) bit of gloom that had settled over him in the aftermath of the Davros… incident was pretty much gone by now. This made for a far more cheerful atmosphere in the TARDIS – the Doctor was happier, and so, by extension, I was happier, and because we were both happy, the TARDIS was happy. It was like old times… As long as neither of us thought too long about Donna, or Rose. But even that was getting easier.

As I expected, I was met with a beaming Doctor when I opened the TARDIS door and stepped outside. "You're going to love this," he said. "Just guess where we are!"

I looked around. We seemed to be in a forest; a very pretty forest, but nonetheless, a seemingly ordinary forest. There was absolutely nothing in this forest that could give me any hint as to where – or when – we might have been. "I give up, Doctor. Where are we?"

"Well," he said, drawing the word out, "we're in England. To be honest, I'm not entirely sure where in England; somewhere in the middle, though, I think. Well, middle… ish." He shrugged, then continued. "More interestingly, the year is 1191."

"Seriously!?" I exclaimed brightly. "This is fantastic!" I've always been interested in that general time period; it was the only section of history classes that I'd thoroughly enjoyed in high school, and I always love a good medieval fair. I couldn't believe the luck of the TARDIS choosing to bring us here! (We were, as far as I knew, still set to random – the Doctor was feeling better, but not quite enough to consciously choose a destination.)

Thinking on medieval fairs, though, something dawned on me. "Wait a minute… I'm wearing jeans and a tee-shirt," I pointed out. "That won't really go over very well in this time period, will it? Bare arms, and pants on a woman?"

The Doctor thought for a moment. "No, I suppose not. You could get away with it, though – you know that, you've managed before in times and places where 21st-century clothing styles aren't exactly the norm. Unless," he added, seeing my grin falter slightly, "you wanted to get changed?"

"Well, sort of, actually," I admitted. "I'd go to medieval fairs and look at all those gorgeous dresses, and I always wished I had a reason to wear one… It just seems that, you know, now I kind of do…" I trailed off.

The Doctor chuckled. "I suppose, then, if you really wanted to, we can spare a few minutes while you find yourself a dress in the wardrobe." Suddenly, he started smiling in that, "I-know-something-you-don't-know" kind of way. "Besides, given what day it is, you deserve to dress however you'd like."

I blinked in confusion. "Um… What day is it? Some sort of holiday?"

"Nope!" he said brightly, popping the "p" and bouncing on his heels. "It is, as a matter of fact… Your birthday!"

"It's – I – what!?" I spluttered, shocked. "It's my birthday?"

"Well, technically," the Doctor answered. "I mean, I doubt that it is here, where and when we've landed, and really, you haven't even been born yet, at this point… But, back in your proper time and place, yes, it's June 6, 2008. You're nineteen! Told you I'd let you know," he beamed at me. "I was going to tell you as soon as you woke up, but then I thought that I'd surprise you with this trip instead. You've mentioned before being interested in this time period, so I figured, why not?"

"You mean, you chose this place, for me?" I asked.

"I did," he answered. "It's a birthday gift!"

I couldn't believe it! This trip was his own idea – which made it the first time since Davros that he'd actually deliberately chosen a place to go. And he'd done it for me. Extremely appreciative (and even somewhat flattered), I thanked him with a huge hug.

"I suppose I should go find myself a dress, then," I smiled, letting go of him.

"Just don't pick anything too flashy!" he called as I retreated back to the TARDIS. "Don't want to stand out!"

I dashed to the wardrobe, and found the section for 13th-century dresses. There were a couple that I would have loved to wear – I would have felt like a princess! – but that exact thought made me wonder if maybe they were, in fact, meant for royalty. I wasn't supposed to stand out, and so I reluctantly turned away from the fancier dresses to look through the slightly plainer ones. I settled on a forest green, linen (I think) dress with tapered sleeves and a square neck; it was completely undecorated, except for a bit of light green stitching at the hems of the bottom and sleeves. I didn't feel quite like a princess, but it was still awesome. (And perfect for the slight-cool weather – I'd been a bit chilly in my tee-shirt earlier.) I grabbed a pair of simple brown shoes, and hoped that the dress would blend in enough to make the Doctor happy.

Based on the Doctor's approving smile as I stepped back out of the TARDIS, I figured I'd chosen well. "Happy now?" he teased.

"As a matter of fact, I am," I told him chirpily. "What do you think?"

"You look lovely," he said. "Now come on, let's go! No idea where to, but finding out is half the fun!"

So, the Doctor and I wandered the forest a bit... But, did I mention that we were in a forest? I mean, a real, legitimate forest. Now, being from Stowe, I'm used to woodsy areas, but the Doctor's and my current location was a forest from back when there weren't cities and cars and random houses spread through it. In other words, this forest was large and thick, and we seemed to be right smack-bang in the middle of it. There wasn't a soul in sight, let alone a town or village to stop by. We walked for about half an hour in one direction, but after coming no closer to any sort of civilization, we decided to turn around and try going the other way from the TARDIS instead.

There was, though, a small problem with that. We walked back to the place where we'd left the TARDIS, only to find it... not there.

"Are you sure we're in the right place?" I asked him.

"Yes, I'm sure we're in the right place," the Doctor responded, sounding more than a little preoccupied. "We landed right here, in front of this tree," he said, patting a nearby trunk. "Remember? It's got the funny little knobbly branch, just there?"

"Um..." Honestly, I thought a lot of the trees we'd seen had funny little knobbly branches; it wasn't that unusual to see, on a tree. But, I've learned, sometimes it's best just to go along with the Doctor. "Right. Of course," I said. "That tree. Thing is... The tree's there, and the TARDIS isn't."

"Yes, I've noticed that..." He trailed off with a frustrated sigh, and started searching the general area. "I don't understand!" he exclaimed, looking behind some trees to our left. "My sense of direction is perfect! Well, nearly perfect, but who's counting?" He dashed over to some trees behind the one we (apparently) had parked the TARDIS in front of. "And I assure you, with 100-percent certainty, that this was the precise spot that we left the - " He broke off suddenly. "Oh, no..."

Well, that sounded bad. "What's wrong?" I asked, worried.

"I've found the TARDIS," he said sadly, pointing away from us as I ran over to him.

Looking in the direction of his point, I saw a road. It was in the opposite direction from where we'd headed before; it wasn't far from where we now stood, but it was down a bit of a hill, which explained why we hadn't seen it before. And on this road, thirty or thirty-five yards away (and counting), was a group of burly, armed men on horseback. Some of these horses were dragging a wooden platform - and on this platform sat the TARDIS, slowly but surely being led away from the Doctor and me.

"Hey!" the Doctor called to the men. They didn't show any sign of having heard him - which didn't surprise me, based on their distance and figuring in the sound of the horses and the dragging platform. Of course, they might have heard him, and just weren't interested in stopping for what would have looked to them to be merely a skinny man in strange clothes, who had nothing but a young woman for back-up.

This didn't stop the Doctor from trying, though. "Oi!" he called again, raising his volume. "Excuse me, but that's my box - !"

At that exact moment, someone came from goodness-knows-where (a tree, maybe?), and knocked both the Doctor and me to the ground. "Mind keeping your voice down, so as not to get us all killed?" the man who tackled us snapped in a vaguely Northern English accent. (Maybe it was a Midlands-area accent? I've been trying to work out the various regional accents now that I live in Britain, but spending most of my time not on Earth makes that tricky.) Not getting killed seemed a good idea to me, so I continued to keep my mouth shut; I was slightly surprised that even the Doctor didn't bother to argue. Maybe he was in shock.

After maybe thirty seconds - time enough, I suppose, for the armed men to get out of earshot – the strange man got off of us and gave me a hand up. As he turned to help the Doctor, I noticed that the man wasn't all that much older than me; there couldn't have been more than ten years between us. There was something odd about him – somehow, he appeared to be both very well-mannered and very mischievous at the same time. I also noticed that he was carrying a bow and a quiver of arrows.

"So," the man asked suddenly, "mind explaining what that was all about?"

"Do we mind explaining!?" the Doctor sputtered in disbelief. "We aren't the ones who just tackled two random strangers! I think that you're the one who should explain!"

"Fair enough," the man answered with a nonchalant shrug. "Those men are with the Sheriff. If they see you as a threat, they'll kill you – no questions asked. You, Sir, standing on the top of a hill in your unusual clothes, screaming at them at the top of your voice, would most certainly be considered a threat. And don't think they would have spared the young lady – if she was with you, she'd suffer the same fate. Now, if I shouted at you, to make you stop shouting, we'd both be making so much noise that all three of us would have been captured and most likely put to death. Aiming to avoid that, I shut you up in the only other way I could think of. I dare say you'd rather be bruised than dead?"

"You have to give him that, Doctor," I pointed out.

"Suppose so," the Doctor agreed.

The strange man nodded. "Thank you. Now, why is it exactly that you were shouting at those guards?"

The Doctor shook his head. "They took my – well, my box. And I need that box." He looked over at me, and added, "We both need that box. It is very, very important that we have that box; without that box, we can't get home."

"I'm very sorry for your loss, my friends," the man said, "but might I ask why you left something so valuable out in plain sight?"

"We didn't know it was in plain sight," I explained. "The way the hill is angled, we couldn't see the road below it – but anyone on the road could see up the hill, and thus see the TAR – the box," I caught myself.

"I see," the man nodded. "It's an understandable mistake; there are many who miss that road from this area of the forest, even those who have lived here all their lives." He smiled at us, appearing truly friendly for the first time. "Tell me, what are your names?"

"I'm the Doctor, and this is my friend, Cate Thomas," the Doctor responded.

"Just 'the Doctor?'" the man asked, raising an eyebrow. The Doctor nodded in response, and the man nodded back. "Alright, then. It's a pleasure to meet you, Doctor, Cate – although I am sorry it had to be in such an… unconventional manner." The Doctor opened his mouth to object to the understatement that was "unconventional," but I put a hand on his arm to stop him.

"I am happy to tell you, though," the man continued with a grin, "that if the Sheriff's taken something of yours without the right to do so, you're talking to the right man. My friends and I have a habit of returning things that the Sheriff has unjustly taken." The man gave a short, quick bow. "I am Robin, Lord of Loxley, though some people call me – "

"Robin Hood!" I finished for him, trying (mostly unsuccessfully) to contain my shock and excitement. No way was I really talking to Robin Hood!

"Well, yes, actually," Robin smiled at me, looking a bit surprised. "I see you've heard of me, then."

"Oh, we certainly have," the Doctor answered far more calmly than I had (though there was a new spark in his eyes). "Stealing from the rich to give to the poor… Talk of you stretches much farther than you know." (Now that was an understatement!)

"I'm flattered," Robin laughed. Then he gave us an appraising look, and added, "You two should follow me. I'll take you back to where my friends and I have set up camp for the night; it is nearly supper time, and we'd be more than happy to have you as guests before you go into town to find accommodation."

"Oh, we'd hate to intrude," the Doctor argued – much to my disappointment.

My mood brightened, though, when it became clear that Robin was having none of the Doctor's objections. "You won't be intruding on anything; I'm inviting you," he said. "Besides, I'd like to hear more about this box of yours – as, I'm sure, would my friends."

"I just don't…" The Doctor glanced over at me, and I gave him my best (although hopefully subtle), "Oh, please?" look. Apparently, it worked, because finally the Doctor sighed and, running a hand through his hair, said, "Oh, alright, then. Thank you very much for your hospitality."

"Think nothing of it," Robin replied. "It's the least I can do after knocking you both to the ground earlier." ("Fair point," the Doctor muttered so that only I could hear him. In response, I discreetly poked him in the ribs and shook my head at him.) "If you two will just come this way, then…" Robin gestured off to the left and started heading in that direction. The Doctor shrugged at me and made to follow him, and I excitedly fell in behind.