Hello! I am SO sorry with how long it's been since I last updated. I have been so flat out. Work is evil, and life is pretty full on. I am, however, also very excited. It's my 21st in 7 days. And my best friend and I now have a website for our original novels. It's a beta reading website where we post our first draft and ask for critiques so we can better it when we edit. It is a private one though, so if you would like to see it, just ask.

So yeah, because of that, I've also been trying to get as much editing of our novel done so that the chapters can get posted.

.

.

.

*The Sontaran Stratagem*

.

Back to Earth

.

.

Rose watched on as Donna flew the TARDIS. She was almost laughing at how worried the Doctor looked at the sight. She was practically having to hold him back from just taking over. There were very few people he trusted to fly the TARDIS, she and Jack amongst them. She, however, knew that the TARDIS would never let Donna crash. And she looked so delighted flying on her own.

"I can't believe I'm doing this!" she almost squealed.

"No, neither can I," he replied. The TARDIS started shaking more than usual. "Oh! Whoa, careful!" he picked up the rubber mallet and bashed the console a bit, before lifting a lever. The mallet was immediately snatched out of his hand and tossed away by Rose. "Getting a bit too close to the 1980's"

"What am I going to do?" she said. "Put a dent in them?"

"Well, someone did," he muttered.

"Oi!" Rose cried, defending her birth decade. It may have just been pure nostalgia she was clinging to, but she had loved it. Suddenly, the mobile in her pocket began to ring. At first it was a surprise. No one had called her in a very long time.

"Hold on, that's a phone!" Donna said in surprise.

"Yep," the Doctor said.

"You have a mobile that works in space?"

"The Doctor supercharged it on my first trip," Rose told her. "But the TARDIS does have a phone, you know."

"Since when?!"

The Doctor scoffed. "This is a call box! Of course it's got a phone!"

"Shh!" Rose hushed, then she opened the phone. "Hello?"

"Rose? It's Martha," she heard her friends voice down the line. "I'm bringing you two back to Earth."

"Martha?!" Rose cried in delight. "Oh my god! Where are you?!"

The Doctor watched in happy surprise as Rose chatted as she ran around the console, putting in coordinates. He hadn't really expected to hear from Martha for a while. He missed her, but after what had happened last time, he wasn't surprised that she wanted to keep her distance. He could feel Rose's elation. It had been weeks since she'd last spoken to Martha, someone she considered to be one of her closest friends.

"Okay, we'll be right there!" she squeaked, hanging up.

"Somebody's excited," Donna smirked.

"Damn right I am!" Rose said. "Donna, I think it's time you met Martha Jones!"

?...DW...?

Rose grinned as the TARDIS landed. The Doctor raised an eyebrow at her.

"You're getting good at that," he commented.

"I better be! Now come on!" Flashing her tongue in teeth grin, she dashed out the door. Donna watched the younger girl in amusement, before looking at the Doctor. He was staring after her with an enamoured grin.

"Ugh!" she groaned. "You two are just so stupidly adorable sometimes!"

"Eh," the Doctor replied, shrugging his shoulders. "Come on, we better get out there before we lose her."

As it turned out, there was no chance of that. As soon as they stepped out of the TARDIS, they were met with the sight of Rose and Martha hugging tightly, small giggles slipping their lips.

"Oh my gosh, look at you! You look great!" Martha said as they stepped back.

"So do you!" Rose gushed. "Interesting outfit." The corners of her mouth twitched down, betraying her smile as a memory slipped through her head. That out fit seemed eerily reminiscent of a certain year best left forgotten... quite literally for most.

As Rose was pondering this, Martha spotted the Doctor. At first they were both calm as they walked towards each other. It seemed odd to watch that. She was so used to the idea of rushing into his waiting arms that she never really considered that this didn't really happen often with other people.

"Martha Jones," he said fondly.

"Doctor," she said. Their faced seemed serious, but their eyes were twinkling with mirth, and in the next second the Doctor had opened his arms wide and swept her into a hug.

"Ah! Yeah!" he grinned happily as he lifted her up, then placed her back down. "You haven't changed a bit!" Rose raised an eyebrow. Really? Did he really think that? Because she could see quite a bit that had changed about her friend. She seemed good, better even, but something was off. The Doctor looked over at her when he felt her doubt.

"Neither have you!" Martha exclaimed, looking him up and down.

"He really hasn't," Rose said. "Well, looks anyway." The Doctor shot her a wink, knowing just how much she liked his looks.

"All right, that's enough you two!" Donna admonished. "What have I said about doing that in public?"

"How's the family?" the Doctor said, quickly changing the subject and ignoring Donna all together. Donna just rolled her eyes at him.

"You know. Not so bad. Recovering."

"That's good," Rose said. "And Leo's still clueless."

"As ever!" Martha laughed. "Keeps wondering what got into us sometimes." She grinned at them uneasily, before her eyes settled on Donna again. "Oh, hello! I'm-"

"Martha Jones," Donna finished. "Rose has mentioned you quite a bit. And himself. I'm Donna. Donna Noble."

"Nice to meet you. Sorry these rude gits didn't introduce us sooner. Their game is slipping."

"Game?" the Doctor questioned.

"Oh, please! Everywhere you go it's 'hello, I'm the Doctor, and this my Rose, and our other companion'!"

"We do not!"

"Actually, we kind of do," Rose said. "But this is a reunion."

"Yeah, Reunions tend to go a little differently." He tugged on his ear.

"You should have seen me and Sarah Jane."

"Speaking of which, please don't start a fight. I can't bare fighting." Both women looked at him with a raised eyebrow.

"Doctor," Rose said, going to stand beside him.

"Mmm?"

"Don't know if you've noticed yet, but they're getting on like a house on fire."

"Oh... Oh, they are, aren't they?! Well, that's good. That's very good. Erm, carry on."

"You two have hardly changed," Martha grinned. "Speaking of which, how are the happy couple?"

"Brilliant," Rose said. The Doctor grinned, making a happy little humming noise as he did, and pulled Rose into him in a side hug.

"They can't bloody keep their hands off each other," Donna rolled her eyes. "They're worse than rabbits! Seriously, I'm scared to touch half the surfaces in that ship!"

Martha burst out laughing. "Oh, wow! You two don't do anything half way, do you? Then again... three years..."

"You have no idea," the Doctor sighed. Rose looked at him oddly when she felt something slip through the bond too quickly for her to catch it. It was clear that he'd forced it out so she wouldn't. She mentally prodded him and he looked over at Martha again, studiously ignoring her. Rose pouted. He was hiding something. He definitely was. Still annoyed, she looked back to Martha as a distraction. That was when she noticed it.

"Hey, since when has that been there!" She cried.

"What?" Rose nodded to the gem on her left ring finger and she brought it up for all to see.

"You're engaged?" the Doctor exclaimed. "Really? Who to?"

"Tom. That Tom Milligan. He's in paediatrics working out in Africa right now."

"Tom from the year that never was?" Rose asked.

"Yeah."

"Oh! I knew you had a thing for him!"

"Yeah, well, I wasn't going to do anything more than that call. But then I got placed at the same hospital as him when UNIT pushed my training through. We just hit it off."

"Good on you!" She was about to say more, but she was cut off by the static sound of a walkie-talkie transmitting.

"Dr Jones, report to base, please."

"And speaking of which..." She picked up the radio at her hip and turned to walk the other way as she talked into it. "This is Dr Jones. Operation Blue Sky is go, go, go. I repeat, this is a go."

The three travellers looked at her in bewilderment. Rose felt dread rise up I her. This was so wrong. It was so familiar and it was so wrong. She found that she was becoming terrified of what her friend could be like now.

She had spent a year with Martha and watched her change into a cold, military like person... Had she been too naïve to hope that she would change when things went back to normal? Then again, things never did go back to normal, did they? The year had reversed, but they had not changed with it. It had been different for all of them. They had grown too much.

They followed Martha, watching in concern as UNIT members ran in, trucks drove about. Orders were being shouted out and Martha looked on with a steely coolness. UINT officers stormed into a near by factory. Once again, she picked up the comm.

"Greyhound Six to Trap One. B Section, go, go go! Search the ground floor, grid pattern Delta."

"What are you searching for?" the Doctor asked her.

"Illegal aliens!" she replied.

"Illegal?" Rose mouthed at him. He just shrugged in reply, his bottom lip sicking out slightly.

Martha ran off shouting commands into her comm. They looked about in horror as soldiers roughly handled the workers of the factory. Shouting at them, manhandling them, forcing the seemingly ordinary people onto their knees.

"Is that what you did to her?" Donna said quietly. "Turn her into a soldier?"

"No," Rose told her. "No, he didn't even know it was happening." Both of them looked at her, the Doctor hadn't realized that she knew Martha could be like this. "He didn't do this to her, the Master did."

"Who?"

"An old... friend of mine. He's dead now."

"And he did that to her?"

"You should have seen what he did to the world," Rose muttered.

They stood around in silence, just watching the goings on until Martha came back to them. That was when the Doctor noticed the badge pinned to her jacket. He'd been listening to the earlier conversation, but he hadn't really clicked on till now.

"You're qualified now? You're a proper doctor?"

"UNIT rushed it though, given my experience in the field. Here we go." She led them across the grounds to the large black truck. "We're establishing a field base on site. They're dying to meet you."

"Wish I could say the same," he muttered.

They were led into the back of the truck, which was surprisingly deceptive on the outside. Inside they were faced with a posh, high-tech headquarters. It didn't even look like they were still on the same truck. And if it weren't for the fact that the inside was about the right size, Rose would have thought they'd found a way to use Time Lord technology.

"Operation Blue Sky complete, sir," Martha said, waking over to a man in high-ranking uniform. "Thanks for letting me take the lead. And this... this is the Doctor. Doctor, Colonel Mace."

"Sir." Colonel Mace stood rigid and raised his hand in salute.

"Oh, don't salute," he complained.

"But it is an honour, sir. I've read all the files on you. Technically speaking, you're still on staff. You never resigned."

"What? You used to work for them?" Donna said in surprise.

"Yeah. A long time ago. Back in the 70's... or was it the 80's?"

"He got Earthbound for a little bit," Rose explained.

"It was all a bit more homespun back then." He looked about at all the computers and the workforce going on around them.

"Times have changed, sir."

"Yeah, that's enough of the 'sir'."

"Come on though, Doctor. You've seen it. You've been on board the Valiant."

"Yeah, not a fan of that place," Rose muttered.

"We've got massive funding from United Nations, all in the name of Homeworld Security."

"A modern UNIT for the modern world."

"What, and that means arresting ordinary factory workers in the streets in broad daylight? It's more like Guantanamo Bay out there. Donna, by the way. Donna Noble, since you didn't ask. I'll have a salute." The Doctor hid his grin as he took off his coat and chucked it over the desk.

Mace looked at the Doctor in bewilderment, and he gave a slight nod. "Ma'am!" He saluted.

"Thank you," Donna said. Rose grinned and shook her head. "You want one too, Rose?"

"No, no. I'm good," she laughed.

"Tell me what's going on in that factory," the Doctor said, now sitting down near the front.

"Yesterday, fifty-two people died in identical circumstances right across the world, in eleven different time zones," Mace said. As he spoke, points popped up on the screen, showing the locations of the deaths. "5am in the UK, 6am in France, 8am in Moscow, 1pm in China-"

"You mean they died simultaneously?"

"Exactly. Fifty-two deaths at the exact same moment world wide."

"How did they die?"

"They were all inside their cars."

"They were poisoned" Martha added. "I checked the biopsies. No toxins. Whatever it is, left the system immediately."

"What have the cars got in common?"

"Completely different makes, but all fitted with ATMOS. And that is the ATMOS factory."

"What's ATMOS?" Rose asked.

"Oh, come on, even I know that," Donna said. "Everyone's got ATMOS."

"Oh, god. It's like Archangel all over again," Rose groaned.

"Archangel? Wasn't that that network thing for your cellphone?"

"Yep, it was," Martha said, frowning.

"What was wrong with it?"

"It was made as a semi-psychic transmitter by a psychopathic alien."

"Can anything just be normal with you lot?" Donna said. "I mean, next you're going to tell me that there are aliens in parliament!"

"Well..." the Doctor shrugged. "There used to be. Anyway."

Soon they were being being led around the factory, watching everything from above on the catwalk.

"Stands for 'Atmostpheric Emissions System'. The ATMOS in your car reduces OC2 emissions to zero."

"Zero? No carbon, none at all?

"And you get sat-nav thrown in, plus 20 quid in shopping vouches if you introduce a friend. Bargain," Donna told them.

"And this is where they make it, Doctor, shipping worldwide," Mace added. "Seventeen factories across the globe, but this is the central depot, sending ATMOS to every country on Earth."

"And you think ATMOS is alien?"

"It's out job to investigate that possibility. Doctor?" He walked off, and they followed, soon coming to another part of the factory, but this time on the ground floor. Mace indicated to a small metal box. "And here it is, laid bare. ATMOS can be threaded through any and every make of car."

"You must've checked it before it went on sale."

"We did," Martha said. "We found nothing. That's why I thought we needed and expert."

The Doctor put on his glasses and began to examine the ATMOS. "Really? Who did you get?" Everyone in the room looked at him with a raised eyebrow or amused expression. "Oh, right! Me, yes! Good."

Martha and Colonel Mace left and the Doctor kept looking about at everything.

"Okay, so why would aliens be so keen on cleaning up our atmosphere?" Donna asked.

"Very good question."

"This is pretty advanced stuff," Rose said. "I thought this wouldn't come in for a few more decades, or centuries."

"Maybe they want to help... get rid of pollution and stuff."

"Do you know how many cars there are on planet Earth?" he asked them. "800 million. Imagine that. If you could control them, you'd have 800 million weapons."

"Well, great," Rose sighed. "So, we only have to fight 800 million cars." She shrugged. "We've faced worse."

.

.

.

Once again, sorry it took so long. I wish I could say that I will try and get the next one out sooner, but I really have no control over how fast I write this anymore. I do promise to try, though. And to get other stories out and done... even if I've hit a block with them. (I know where I want to take them all, the words just hate me right now).

Thanks SO much for sticking with me. I love you all!