So for the most part, this episode doesn't have much opportunity for many cut offs so these chapters (except this one) will be quite a bit longer than usual and the episode itself is structured kind of strangely so despite attempts, I'm not a professional writer, the chapters will be a bit jumpy. I know I usually write relatively short chapters so if you like longer chapters then here you go.

Since this is an actual Doctor Who episode I feel as though I need to say I do not own it, I don't own anything (except Athena).

Enjoy the chapter and please R&R!

The Doctor looked back and forth in between Athena and this new woman. "Funny thing is I don't often do Easter, I can never find it. It's always at a different time." Athena was always entertained by his babbling, but she could tell the other woman was not amused. "Although, I remember the original. Between you and me, what really happened was-oh!" The Doctor gave a little jolt.

"You okay?" Athena asked.

"Yeah…yeah I'm okay. Hold on, something in my pocket…hold that for me!" He handed the chocolate to the mystery woman, who by this point, had fully turned around to watch the ridiculous duo behind her. "Actually, go on, have it. Finish it, it's full of sugar and I'm determined to keep these teeth. And she shouldn't be eating anything bad for her anyways." He jerked his head at Athena to enunciate his point, earning him an eye roll from Athena. He fished around and pulled out a hand-held contraption with blue lights and a small satellite dish on top. "Oh, I forgot I had this."

"You forgot you were carrying that thing around with you?" Athena questioned.

"Yeah, big pockets. Bigger on the inside…I tend to forget…don't judge me." Athena couldn't help her giggling. He was one frazzled spaceman. "Oh…we've got excitation! I'm picking up something very strange…"

"I know the feeling." The woman muttered. Athena shot her a glare and turned back around to the Doctor.

"What does this little thing track?" She asked.

"This little thing tracks Rondium particles. The little dish should go around, that little dish there." He flicked it a few times, but it remained stationary. The Doctor sighed but continued to analyze the readings he was getting.

"Right now a way out would come in pretty handy. Can you detect me one of those?" The woman asked, seemingly trying to get the two of them to stop talking.

A black woman sitting across the aisle from Athena and the Doctor made herself known. "Lou, can you hear them?"

"Hear what, sweetheart?" Her husband asked.

"The voices…so many voices. Calling to us…calling so far." She appeared to be in a trance. Athena was starting to get more interested in her and what she was saying than what the Doctor was doing.

"Ah! The little dish is going around. Look, Athena, look." He tugged on her shirt.

"Doctor…I think something…" She began.

The Doctor climbed over Athena and got up and into the aisle, apparently trying to follow the signal. Athena then noticed that there were police cars behind them. The bus had gone through a tunnel. If this bus was being tailed by multiple police cars then there would be police waiting for them at the front, blocking them in.

"Ow, ow ow!" The Doctor shouted as the contraption started sparking and smoking in his hand.

"Can't you turn that thing off?" The woman snapped.

"What was your name?" The Doctor asked, turning to the woman.

"Christina." She sneered.

"Christina." He muttered. "Hold on tight. Athena! Hold on tight! Everyone, hold on tight!" The Doctor sat back down, edging Athena towards the window while pulling her into him, trying to shield her with his body.

Without warning, the bus shook violently. Everyone got jostled around and the Doctor and Athena got thrown into the aisle. Windows started breaking, the metal started buckling and bursting, and the lights all went out and started sparking.

"The voices! They're screaming!" The same woman shouted over the noise.

Then suddenly, it all stopped.

Athena got up and looked out the window. She didn't see a London motorway tunnel anymore. Instead she saw a desert, spanning for who knows how many miles. Hundreds, thousands. She had to sit down, the shock was too overwhelming.

"Is everybody okay?" Athena shouted. She got back a series of noncommittal grunts and whimpers.

"Come on, let's go investigate." The Doctor whispered into her ear, grabbing her hand and pulling her off of the seat. "Are you okay?" He gave her a once over, twirling her around. He examined her eyes for another concussion.

"Yeah, I'm fine. You?" He smiled, clicked his tongue and winked at her. "Shall we?" She gestured out the window.

"Yes we shall." They exited the bus and strolled out onto the sand. It was considerably hotter outside than it had been inside. "End of the line." The Doctor muttered. "Call it a hunch, but I think we've gone a little bit further than Brixton." The other passengers of the bus started filing out. The Doctor crouched down and put his glasses on. He grabbed a handful of sand and let it run through his fingers.

"It's boiling, don't you want to take your coat off?" Athena asked.

"In a minute, busy…" The Doctor muttered, studying the sand.

Athena huffed and gave up. "Where are we? Have you been here before?" She asked in a low whisper.

"No idea…it's not the Sahara, look." He turned his attention to the sky. "Three suns. We're on a different planet."

"That's impossible! There are three suns! Three of them!" A blonde woman shouted as she exited the bus, obviously terrified.

"Like when all those planets were up in the sky!" A young black boy came to his own conclusion.

"But it was the Earth that moved then, wasn't it?" A young white boy questioned.

"Oh man…we're on another world!" The black boy responded.

The driver came out to assess the damage. "It's still in tact though. Not as bad as it looks if the chassie is still holding together." He sighed, "My boss is gonna murder me."

"Can you still drive it?" The blonde woman asked.

"No…no, the wheels are stuck. They're never going to budge." He said, a tone of defeat in his voice.

Christina walked up to the Doctor and Athena. Now that she was standing, she towered over Athena, she was almost as tall as the Doctor. She had a new air of confidence about her now. She put on a pair of sunglasses and beamed at Athena and the Doctor. "Ready for any emergency."

The Doctor quirked up an eyebrow. He would not be bested. He took his glasses off and after a couple seconds of buzzing with his sonic, managed to tint the lenses. "Me too." He dug through his pockets and pulled out another pair of sunglasses and handed them to Athena.

"And what are your names again?"

"I'm the Doctor." He muttered, sifting through some more sand.

"And I'm Athena."

"Name, not rank." Christina bit back, ignoring Athena.

"The Doctor." He continued sifting through the sand, not paying her too much mind.

"Surname?"

"The Doctor."

"You're called the Doctor?"

"Yes I am."

"That's not a name, that's a psychological condition."

"You get used to it." Athena mumbled. Christina shot her a look, it felt like she was glaring at Athena. It made Athena's skin crawl.

"This isn't just sand, there's a trace of something else." He sniffed it a little.

"Don't put it in your mouth…don't—" The Doctor licked his fingers. "What did I tell you?" Athena berated him.

He tasted it and quickly decided he didn't like it. He tried spitting it out. "Oh that's not good! Not good! Bad!"

"You're not supposed to put sand in your mouth, you know that." Athena lectured. The Doctor stuck his tongue out at her.

The Doctor tried to spit out the last of the sand. "But it's not just sand, it tastes like…" he sniffed the air and stood up, "never mind."

"What is it, what's wrong?" Athena asked. The Doctor shook his head at her, "Nothing. Don't worry about it."

The black boy spoke up, "Hold on a minute. I saw you, man you had that thing, that machine. Did you make this happen?"

The Doctor groaned and whispered to Athena, "Oh, humans on busses, always blaming me." He straightened back up and faced the angry crowd, "Look look, if you must know, my device was tracking a hole in the fabric of reality, call it a hobby, but it was a tiny little hole. No danger to anyone. Suddenly it gets big and we drive right through it."

"Then where is it? There's nothing, there's just sand." The driver asked, completely bewildered.

"You want proof? We drove through this." The Doctor picked up a handful of sand and threw it in front of him. The air reverberated like gelatin.

"And that's…?" Christina asked.

"A door. A door in space." The Doctor responded.

"So what you're saying is that on the other side of that is home? We can get to London from there?" The driver asked, getting more and more excited.

"The bus came through, we can't." The Doctor informed everyone.

"Well then, what are we waiting for?" The driver exclaimed. He ran towards the door, despite the Doctor and Athena shouting at him to stop. "I'm going home, mates!" He reached the door and then burst into flames, screaming. They caught a glimpse of a skeleton just before it disappeared on the other side.

"That was a skeleton, man! That was bones, just bones!" The black boy shouted. He sat down on the ground and held his head in his hands. The white boy comforted the blonde lady, who was now crying hysterically.

"How did we survive, then? The bus?" Athena asked. "Did it protect us?"

"Yeah, it was the bus. Look at the damage. Great big box of metal." The Doctor assured her.

"Like in a thunderstorm, yeah? Safest place is inside a car, cause the metal conducts the lightning right through. I studied it in school." The white boy piped up.

"If we could only travel back inside the bus…a car needs to be closed, that thing has been ripped open." Christina explained.

"Slight indyanmics with the wormhole, there's enough metal to make it work I think." The Doctor replied, not too sure of himself.

"Then we have to drive five tons of bus, which is currently buried in the sand, and we've got nothing but our bare hands, correct?" Christina asked.

"I'd say nine and a half tons, but your point still stands, yeah."

"Then we need to apply ourselves to the problem with discipline. Which starts with appointing a leader." Christina addressed the crowd.

"Yes, at last, thank you. So…" The Doctor began, stepping forward.

"Well thank goodness you've got me. Everyone do exactly as I say and get inside the bus immediately." Christina rattled off orders. The Doctor's eyes widened and he turned his attention back to Athena. She shrugged her shoulders and moved over to join him.

"Is it safe in there?" The white boy asked.

"I don't think anything's safe anymore. But if it's a choice between baking in there and roasting out here, I'd say baking's slower. Come on, all of you, right now." Christina ordered. Everybody started getting back onto the bus. "And you two. On you go."

"Yes ma'am." Athena and the Doctor said in unison. As soon as they stepped onto the bus Athena yanked the Doctor's coat off. He turned around with his eyes wide. "You're going to broil, I don't care about your advance physiology." He smirked and took the coat back from her, folded it up, kissed her forehead and led them to a bench in the back of the bus.

Christina started off her command by rattling off points that everybody should follow. Athena stopped paying attention after point two and the Doctor had never paid attention to start with. He had been too busy looking out towards the horizon, trying to figure out where they were.

Christina cleared her throat, commanding both Athena and the Doctor's attention. "Point five. The crucial point is do not panic. Apart from anything, the smell of sweat inside this thing is reaching atrocious levels. We don't need to add anymore. Point six, team identification. Names. I'm Christina. This man, is apparently, the Doctor. And the girl covered in tattoos and piercings next to him is Athena." Athena and the Doctor both scowled at her. She could tell they would not get along.

"Hello." Both Athena and the Doctor said in unison, both trying to give pleasant smiles.

"And you?" Christina asked the white boy.

"Nathan." He stated, giving an awkward wave to everyone.

"I'm Barkley." The black boy said.

"Angela. Angela Whittaker." The blonde woman said.

"My name is Louie. Everyone calls me Lou. And this is Carmen." Said the older black man sitting across from the Doctor and Athena.

"Excellent." Christina began. "Memorize those names, there might be a test." Athena rolled her eyes and leaned her head against the Doctor's shoulder. "Point seven, assessment and application of knowledge. Over to you, the Doctor."

"I thought you were in charge." He said, sitting up and forcing Athena off of him.

"I am. And a good leader utilizes her strength. You seem to be the brain box, so, start boxing."

"Right," he started. He sat up on top of the back of the bench. "The wormhole. We were in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was just an accident."

"No. It wasn't." Carmen spoke up. "That thing? The doorway? Someone made it, for a reason."

"How do you know?" Athena asked, eyes wide.

"She's got a gift." Lou started. "Every since she was a little girl, she can just, tell things. We do the lottery twice a week."

"You don't look like millionaires." Christina muttered. Athena glared at her. How judgmental could a person be?

"No. But we win ten pounds. Every week, twice a week, ten pounds. Don't tell me that's not a gift." Lou replied, level headed. Athena admired his serenity.

"Tell me, Carmen, how many fingers am I holding up?" The Doctor asked. He held up three fingers behind his back.

"Three…" He held up one more finger. "Four." She responded.

"Very good. Low level psychic ability exasperated by an alien sun." The Doctor mumbled to himself. He climbed over Athena and sat down, facing Carmen and Lou. "What can you see, Carmen? Tell me what's out there."

"Something…something is coming. Riding on the wind. And shining." She responded.

"What is it?" He pried.

"Death. Death is coming." Carmen said defiantly.

The entire cab burst into cries and screams and frenzied noises. Neither the Doctor nor Christina were able to calm them down. Athena stood up onto her bench and shouted, "Stop it! Everyone, stop it!" Everyone was stunned into silence except for Angela, who continued to cry. Athena jumped down from the bench and walked over to her, sitting down next to her. "Angela, may I ask you a question? When you got on this bus, where were you going?"

"Doesn't matter now, does it?" She replied through her sobs.

"Please answer the question." Athena pried, taking Angela's hand in her's.

"Just home."

"What's home?" She asked.

"Me. And Mike. And Suzanne, that's my daughter, she's 18."

"Suzanne? That's wonderful." Athena smiled.

The Doctor saw what Athena was doing. He turned to face Barkley, "What about you?" he asked.

"Dunno. Going around to Tina's."

"Whose Tina, your girlfriend?" He pried.

"Not yet." He replied with a smirk.

"Good boy." He responded, matching Barkley's smirk while shooting a glance at Athena. "What about you, Nathan?" The Doctor continued.

"Bit strapped for cash. Lost my job last week. Was gonna stay in and watch TV."

"Brilliant. And you two?" He turned his attention to Carmen and Lou.

"I was gonna cook." Lou responded. Carmen chimed in, "It's his turn tonight. Then I clear up."

"What's for tea?" The Doctor asked.

"Chops. Nice couple of chops and gravy. Nothing special." Lou replied.

"Oh, that's special. That is so special. Chops and gravy, hmm. What about you, Christina?" The Doctor turned to their esteemed leader.

"I was going…so far away." She answered, staring at her feet.

"Far away, chops and gravy, watching TV, Mike and Susanne, and poor old Tina." The Doctor rattled off. "Just think of them. Cause that planet out there, three suns and a wormhole and alien sand, that planet is nothing. You hear me? Nothing compared to all those things waiting for you. Food, home and people. Hold on to that. Because we're going to get there. I promise, I'm going to get you home."

It hadn't taken long before everybody started working. Barkley and Nathan were on the upperdeck, well what was left of it, tearing the cushions off of the seats. Angela was searching around for a spare set of keys. The Doctor asked Lou to tell him if Carmen saw anything else. The Doctor, Athena, and Christina were all outside trying to assess the damage done to the bus.

"Here we go!" Barkley shouted as he and Nathan came out of the bus with several cushions.

"That's my boys! See, we'll lay a flat surface between here and the wormhole, we can reverse into it." The Doctor rattled off. He handed one of the cushions to Athena who then positioned it behind one of the rear wheels.

"Let some air out of the tires, just a little bit. Spreads the weight of the bus, gives you more grip against the sand." Christina added, sounding very triumphant.

"Oh…that's good." The Doctor replied, impressed.

"Holidays in the Kalahari." She responded, a sly smile on her face.

"Hey, no flirting." Athena teased the Doctor while they laid down the cushions. "At least wait til I'm gone." She laughed a little.

"I'm not flirting." He sounded a little hurt. "Trust me, I'm not flirting." He kissed her forehead and bounded over to the others. Athena sat on the ground, a bit dizzy from the heat.

"Yeah but those wheels go deep." Barkley had just said.

"Then start digging." Christina replied.

"What with?" Barkley demanded.

"With this." Christina pulled a shovel out of her backpack. The Doctor took it from her, unfolded it, and gave it to Barkley.

"Got anything else in there?" The Doctor asked, very curious.

"Try that." She pulled a small axe out of her backpack and handed it to Nathan. "Might help with the seats." Nathan took off for the bus again.

"I can't find the keys!" Angela shouted at no one in particular. The Doctor ran to the bus doors. "No no, buses don't have keys. There's the masterswitch and then one button to start and the other to stop, yeah?" The Doctor rattled off.

"Right hold. All right, I got it." She found the switches. "Here we go, hold tight." The engines spluttered and coughed.

"Oh, that doesn't sound too good." The Doctor ran over to where the engine was stored and sonicked the hood open. "Oh, never mind having to move the top deck, you know what's worse? Sand. Tiny little grains of sand, the engine's clogged up." He gave his diagnosis to Christina. She ran around to the other side of the bus, "Anyone know mechanics?"

"Me. I did a two week MVQ at the garage. Never finished it, but…" Barkley finished unconfidently.

"Off you go then. Try stripping the air filter, fast as you can." The Doctor ordered. Barkley ran to the engine and began inspecting. "Athena? Athena, where are you?" Athena got up from where she was sitting and walked around to the other side of the bus. "Are you okay? You don't look too good." He said concerned, examining her. "What's wrong?"

"What is it, what's wrong?" Christina asked the Doctor.

"No it's…don't worry about it Christina." He snapped. He turned his attention back to Athena and took her head in his hands. "Tell me what's wrong."

"Just feel a bit dizzy is all. Nothing to worry about."

"Okay…" The Doctor mumbled. "Let's get you inside."

"No, really, I'm fine." She responded, her voice sounding very weak.

"I'm not having you outside." He ordered.

"If she says she can work she can work." Christina snapped.

"No, no, she can't work. She shouldn't be in this heat." The Doctor responded, superior tone shining through. "On the bus with you."

"Really, I'm fine." Athena replied.

"Of course you are." He responded through clenched teeth. He pulled Athena towards him and started leading her towards the bus. "I'm not taking any risks." He said. "You need to take it easy."

"That's not fair!" She could hear her voice raising.

"That's perfectly fair! Besides, I'm going to go survey the area, can't have you walking around with me."

"But I want to help." The Doctor pushed her into the bus and had her sit down on one of the benches. Christina followed them, very confused. "I'm perfectly fine."

"The last person who said that to me was not perfectly fine, so I'm not going to listen to you." He rattled off. He kissed her forehead and then Christina understood immediately.

"You can't give her preferential treatment, Doctor." Christina sneered.

"I'm protecting her health." He responded, still studying Athena. "Besides, if I knew she could work then she would be out there working and you can believe me she would be working harder than the rest of us." He replied bitterly.

"We're all risking our health, why is she so special? Cause you like her?"

"Yeah, as a matter of fact, yes." He straightened up. "And I'm not—"

"Calm down Doctor." Athena warned. He turned his attention back to her and she shook her head.

"Right…" He crouched down in front of her again. "I'll be back in two ticks." He ran off the bus.

"Wait a minute! You're the man with all the answers. I'm not letting you out of my sight." Christina shouted after him, running off the bus to follow him. Athena could see him already halfway up one of the dunes surrounding the bus. She watched as Christina tried to run after him. She sat back on the bench, grateful that is was much cooler inside than outside, but she still felt a bit dizzy.

"You need to be careful." Carmen said from the back of the bus.

Athena turned around to face her. "What do you mean? Who needs to be careful?"

"You do. Otherwise it will happen again."

Athena's faced blanched. "What…what will happen again?"

"The exact same thing." Athena turned her attention away from Carmen and focused on the wall in front of her. Carmen continued her vision, "And he will react so much worse."