"Quick jump into the not too distant future," the Doctor said, and I raised my eyebrow up at him.
"I thought you tried to avoid that so that companions couldn't get any spoilers," I said, and the Doctor gave me a sort of sideways nod.
"Well," he drawled, and I raised both my eyebrows at him for good measure. He gave me a smile. "I trust that you will use your knowledge responsibly."
"I'm touched," I said and rested my hand over my heart. "When are we going?"
"2035."
"And the where?" I asked as I smiled at his enthusiasm.
"New York. You'll love the history of the city and I'm fairly certain that I've never been there in 2035," he said.
"The amount of confidence that you can exude when you say fairly certain is astonishing and admirable," I said.
"Just for that I won't take you to see Hamilton," he said. "Although really I should take you on opening night to give you the proper experience."
"What's Hamilton?" I asked, and he made a motion like he was zipping his lips.
"I'm not going to tell you because I just figured out what I'm giving you for your birthday," he said.
"What happened to 1920's Paris? Did you give up already?"
"I have not given up. 1920's Paris was to apologize for our fight. Your birthday is going to be something else," he said and tapped on the tip of my nose as he stepped back so I could do the landing. I'd mastered them at this point, but we'd gotten into a bit of a groove recently.
"And do I get to plan for your birthday? Or have you reached such an age that you don't celebrate anymore?" I teased, and he laughed.
"Technically Time Lords don't celebrate them, but I have had many a birthday shindig in the past," he said before his smile dropped. "No one's asked me about it in a very long time."
"I hope you realize that I'm now going to subject you to the biggest birthday party that you are willing to sit through," I said, and he laughed again.
"Shall we go, or do you want to stand here and bicker a bit more?" He asked, though there was a pleased flush to his skin. I beamed at him in satisfaction.
"Why not both?" I asked and bounced towards the door. I paused to see if the Doctor would insist on going out first when he gestured towards the door.
"No ladies first I insist," he said, and I opened the door and stepped out.
"Once again you seem to have nailed the time period and completely missed the city you were aiming for," I said as I glanced around the round plastic hallway that I was standing in. The Doctor shut the door behind me, glanced around and groaned.
"Although," I said as I watched some kind of machine drive past the wall of the hallway. "I will say I was not expecting this."
"I really thought I had it this time," he said with a pout. I patted his arm.
"Being fifty percent right is still a passing grade."
"Barely," he said. I shrugged at him.
"Well I don't know what to tell you. You should have plenty of practice under your belt." I pressed my face against the plastic wall and peered out. "Are we underground?"
"Most definitely," he said as he pressed his face against the wall as well. "Must be on one of the Vulcan expeditions."
"What's a Vulcan expedition?" I asked as I stepped away from the wall.
"Apollo for moon, Vulcan for Earth," the Doctor said.
"And no one considered that Vulcan expedition sounds like something out of Star Trek?" I asked. The Doctor laughed.
"Apparently not," he said as he pointed his hands down either direction of the hallway and wiggled his eyebrows at me. I pursed my lips in thought.
"So, a mining expedition?" I said as I tapped on his right hand and he nodded as we started walking down the part of the hallway the Doctor had been pointing to.
"More or less. The world leaders decided that they should have a greater knowledge of everything Earth based before they started to spread through the stars," he said.
"That seems reasonable. I'm hoping that due to the time period it was a little less catastrophic than the space race."
"Such diplomatic phrasing," he teased and laughed when I stuck my tongue out at him. "But yes, it was much less catastrophic. There were fourteen Vulcanic expeditions that ran simultaneously in various parts of the globe."
"Who ran it?"
"UNIT," he said.
"Am I allowed to ask what the expeditions uncovered?" I asked, and he laughed again.
"You are." I waited several moments to see if he would respond without prompting but judging by the slightly manic grin on his face, I didn't think he would, so I made a go on gesture. "Greater understanding of Earth's rocks and minerals. A more efficient way to use geothermal energy."
"Cool," I said just as we rounded a corner and came across six people, three of whom were holding guns. The Doctor and I both raised our hands immediately. "Not cool."
"Who are you? Where did you come from? What are you doing here?" A harsh looking middle-aged man barked, and the Doctor arched an eyebrow at him.
"The Doctor and Emma. Over there. Exploring." The Doctor gave all the guns a pointed look. "Now if you could either lower your guns or point them all at me please."
"We could split them sixty forty?" I offered because I didn't really want all the guns pointed at the Doctor. He and the middle-aged man both sent me a look at the same time. I shrugged as a young woman popped up on her toes over everyone else's shoulders.
"Are you The Doctor?" She asked, and the Doctor nodded slowly, and she squeaked in excitement before she darted around everyone in front of her and raced up to the Doctor to shake his hand.
"Lower your guns." I heard the middle-aged man say with a sigh as the woman continued to shake the Doctor's hand enthusiastically.
"Sorry, have we met?" The Doctor asked dazedly, and she shook her head as she dropped his hand.
"No. I'm just a huge fan of your work, I've read all the case files that mention your name. I'm Justine, I'm the geologist here," she said, and the Doctor beamed.
"Pleasure to meet you," he said. Justine turned to me and shook my hand as well, even though I didn't think I deserved the enthusiasm she put behind it.
"What do you do?" She asked, and I blushed slightly.
"I studied history and now I travel with the Doctor," I said.
"Oh wow. I took a few history classes and enjoyed them. I wish I had enough passion to study it," she said, and I could tell she was sincere, unlike some others I'd known over the course of my life who studied the hard sciences.
"Humanities," one of the gun holders said with a slight sneer. Justine rolled her eyes and shot him an angry look.
"Shut up Paul," she said just as the main man stepped forward and cleared his throat pointedly with a frown. The Doctor assessed him carefully, and from what I could see of the Doctor's facial expression he was the kind of solider that the Doctor hated.
"The Doctor has not interacted with UNIT in almost twelve years." I glared at him because I did not like his condescending tone at all.
"Well, it hasn't been that long for me Major," the Doctor replied lightly. He must have figured out his rank based on the stripes in his uniform. There were several tense silent moments before another woman stepped forward with a slight eye roll at the Major.
"If you had read some previous case files you would recognize him from the pictures Major," She said and nodded to each of us in a motherly way. I liked her already. "I'm Marishka the physicist here."
"Doctor what are you doing here?" the Major asked sharply. I decided I did not like him at all and judging by Marishka and Justine's faces they weren't exceptionally fond of him either.
"Well honestly I didn't expect to be here. I was aiming for New York to show Emma some American history," he said and rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. I patted him on the shoulder consolingly again.
"And you decided to explore anyways?" the Major asked and Marishka rolled her eyes.
"Honestly Major Campbell you'd think they were terrorists the way you're interrogating them," she snapped, and they quickly ducked their heads together as they started arguing quietly between themselves. The Doctor's face dropped, and I tugged on his sleeve in question.
"Justine, which Vulcan expedition is this?" He asked.
"We're number 10. We're the deepest one," she said, and the Doctor nodded in thanks. She smiled back at us before she pivoted to watch the Major and Marishka argue.
"Tell me what's happening." I hissed under my breath. "You've got a weird look."
"Vulcan expedition number 10 goes down in history as one of the greatest unsolved mysteries of all time. The crew that was working was only a skeleton crew because it was a holiday and when the rest of the crew came back everyone except for the mechanical engineer Cecelia had completely vanished. No trace of them was ever found and Cecelia never breathed a word about it for the rest of her life." I glanced over at the only other girl who hadn't given her name, so she must have been Cecelia. She must have been close to my age, so what ever happened must have been truly awful for her to have never said anything until she died.
"You don't think that we've just stumbled right into the middle of what ever happened? Happens? Is happening?" I scrunched my face up in confusion. "Tenses get really weird when you travel through time."
"Major Frank Campbell, physicist Marishka Suranjay, chemical engineer Paul Johnson, mechanical engineer Cecilia Emmagen, IT specialist Christopher Smithe and geologist Justine Jaeb. They're all here Emma, and it's only them," the Doctor said as he nodded towards each person in turn, looking more and more frazzled as he went along. I grabbed his hand.
"Hey easy, what's wrong?" I asked just as it hit me. He'd encountered a scenario almost exactly like this before on Mars and I definitely remembered how that had ended.
"Let's not panic," I said, and the Doctor shot me a look which made me feel better because it made him look more like himself.
"Emma, last time-" I cut him off as quickly as I could.
"Last time is not indicative of every time. And if you believed that you would have stopped travelling long ago. Is this fixed?" I asked, and he shook his head.
"No."
"Are you one hundred percent sure that this is the right holiday skeleton crew?"
"No." I beamed at him.
"There you go. This could be any other day and we are going to treat it as such," I said, and the Doctor laughed before he leaned over and pressed a lingering kiss to my temple.
"What would I do without you?"
"You managed nine hundred years without me. I'm sure you developed some kind of coping mechanisms," I said dryly, and he laughed again.
"Well then I never want to learn how to do without you again," he said, and I laughed as well while I rolled my eyes just as a memory of how the other Doctor had looked in the vision from the Face of Boe rose up. I hoped that Doctor, where ever he was, had learned.
"What the Hell is that?" Christopher asked as an alarm started going off.
"One of the drills has malfunctioned," Cecilia said, and everyone started jogging down the hallway. The Doctor shot me a look as we hurried after them.
"Perfectly normal day huh?"
"Well we had no proof up until this moment."