Time.
Sarah Jane Smith had travelled in it. She had been instrumental in mending it. She had seen it buffetting the Doctor with hurricane force once, when she discovered that "the winds of time" wasn't just a poetic fancy. You'd think, she grumbled to herself, being friends with a Time Lord would give you some sort of special dispensation when it came to time. But no.
It still got away from her.
"Eveline?" she said into her mobile as she climbed down the steps and headed toward her Prius. "Is Dora in?" She frowned as she unlocked the car door and opened it, switching the phone from one ear to the other. "I'm supposed to be there in fifteen. Running a bit late. Can you put me into her voice mail? Thanks." She slid behind the wheel, closed the door and settled her handbag on the passenger seat while she waited for the beep. "Dora? Sarah Jane. I'm just going to be a bit late. I know, I missed the last deadline entirely. I am so sorry and I appreciate you giving me another chance. I just had a...family emergency to deal with three weeks ago. You know how it is. Anyway...."
She stopped. She had glanced up at her living room window as she got her keys out, and saw a light flashing there. She opened the car door a crack and...yes...there it was. A whooshing, wheezing, groaning sound, music to her ears, coming from her house.
"Erm...Dora? I think I'm about to have another family emergency," she said into the phone. Then she grinned. "I'll call back when I know for sure what's up."
She disconnected, got out of the car, and ran back up the steps. She was so excited, she had trouble getting the house key into the lock, but soon had the door open and was hurrying through. Just as she was about to round the corner from the entryway to the living room, she heard an unfamiliar and very puzzled female voice.
"Doctor? You've landed us in someone's living room!"
Sarah's momentum carried her around the corner, but then she skidded to a halt. There, as she expected, was the familiar old blue police box that was, of course, about as far from being an old blue police box as anything could be. But there, as she had not expected, stood a stunningly beautiful young woman with huge dark eyes, black hair, and perfect cafe-au-lait skin.
Then the Doctor stepped out of the TARDIS, all long arms and legs and wild hair and sparkling brown eyes and big shining grin, and she forgot about the strange woman in her living room and just ran to him. He met her half way, scooped her up in his arms and spun her around twice before he put her back down.
"Sarah Jane!" he said with delight. "How long has it been?"
"Three weeks for me," she answered. "You?"
"Oh, couple of years," he said dismissively. He tugged on his earlobe with a frown. "The TARDIS seems to have a thing about you and three weeks."
"She does, doesn't she?" Sarah grinned up at him.
He shrugged. "Well. She usually has a good reason for what she does." Then he went back to smiling down into her eyes.
Sarah ran her hands down his arms and let them come to rest holding his. She drank in the sight of him for a second, then darted her eyes to the side and raised her eyebrows.
He took the hint. "Ah. Yes. Sarah Jane, I want you to meet Martha. Martha Jones, this is Sarah Jane Smith. Martha's been travelling with me for awhile now." He leaned down, gave her a pointed look and raised his eyebrows. "She's a doctor in training."
Sarah gave him a delighted smile, looked at Martha, then looked back at him and laughed.
"Is that funny?" Martha asked.
"Oh, no," Sarah said quickly. "It's wonderful. Just wonderful." She reached out a hand, then both hands, to Martha, who hesitantly offered her hand to be shaken. "I'm very pleased to meet you, Doctor Jones."
She smiled a bit bashfully. "Not Doctor yet, I'm afraid."
"Close enough," Sarah said. She looked up at the Doctor again, wrapped an arm around his waist and gave him a squeeze. "Oh, you!" She noticed Martha's small frown and answered it. "How long have you been travelling with him, Martha?""
"Hard to say," Martha answered. "We travel in time, you know." She tipped her head back a bit and fixed Sarah with a challenging look.
Sarah smiled, letting the challenge blow right by. "I know. And how many times since you've been with him has he taken your advice?"
Martha looked at the Doctor, then back at Sarah. "He does that?"
"Martha," the Doctor said warningly.
"Not often," Sarah answered.
"Sarah," he said in the same tone.
She gave him a cheeky grin, then turned back to Martha. "This time he actually did. We said he should find someone just like you to travel with. And here he's done it." She turned amazed eyes up to him. He sighed theatrically and gave her a slow blink, but then his features relaxed into a grin. "I want to hear all about how you met and what you've done and where you've been. Come on into the kitchen, I'll put the kettle on." Her eyes snapped to extra-wide. "Oh, and I have a phone call to make." She pulled her mobile out and dialed as she walked toward the kitchen, waving to them to follow her.
"Sarah," the Doctor said, following, but slowly. "I thought we'd go out to lunch."
She turned, phone to her ear, listening to both it and him. "Great. There's a new restaurant by the park I've been wanting to try."
"That's not..." he started to say, but she held up a finger.
"Dora! Hi. Sarah Jane." She gave the Doctor and Martha an apologetic look. "Yes, I'm so sorry, I know I should be there now. Just had a family emergency come up. Yes. Another one." She rolled her eyes for her guests' benefit. "Dora, you don't need to have a family to have a family emergency," she said into the phone. "Trust me. You don't." She smiled at the Doctor, reached out with her free hand and touched his shoulder, reassuring herself he was really there. "Can we reschedule? Tomorrow?" She looked up at the Doctor with a question in her eyes, and he gave her a "sure, why not?" shrug. "Late in the day would be best. Just in case. Great, thank you, see you then."
She snapped the phone shut. "Now. What's this about lunch?"
"I wanted to take you to lunch. Give you and Martha a chance to get to know each other. And Harry, if he's free."
Sarah snapped the phone back open and hit speed dial. "Harry?" she said into the phone a moment later. "Guess who's here." She paused a second, listening. "No, he's fine. Looks remarkably fit, in fact," she added, smiling at the Doctor. "Just wants to take us to lunch." She glanced at Martha. "Someone new to meet. You'll like her. Just what the doctor ordered." She paused, listening. "No, you're the doctor who ordered it this time. Remember? Yes, a doctor in training." She looked Martha up and down appraisingly. "Yes. Extremely." She listened again. "I suggested that new place by the park." The Doctor shook his head at her. "Hang on, he seems to have a different idea." She moved the phone away from her mouth and looked at the Doctor with eyebrows raised, questioning.
"I was thinking something a bit more exotic," he said, nodding toward the TARDIS.
"Oh," Sarah said. Then she felt a grin of delight spread across her face. "Oh," she said again, a much happier and more excited 'oh' this time. She moved the phone back up. "Harry? He really wants to take us out to lunch." She put a strong emphasis on the 'out'. Then she listened. She shot an amused glance at the Doctor and her lips curled as she listened some more. "Harry." Then she listened some more. "Harry." Emphatically this time. "It's just lunch. Come on. When's the last time you had some parboiled zagblots?" She listened some more, grinning into the phone. "Well, you liked that broasted whatchamathingy we had on Torpuna. Remember? The one with all the legs?" Another pause. "Well, that's hardly fair. Skaro was in the middle of a war." Another pause. "Fine, I'll bring you a doggy bag." More listening, this time with her face growing serious. "Harry. It's just lunch. Really. You won't need to bring in the post or water the plants. But I appreciate the offer." Another pause, then she moved the phone away from her mouth again. "He says thanks but he'll take a rain check."
"Figured that," the Doctor muttered.
Sarah grinned at him, then spoke into the phone again. "He says fine. Gotta go, spoilsport. Have fun at your boring old desk in your boring old office. I'll call when I get back." She looked up at the Doctor, suddenly serious, then turned away. "Me too," she said quietly into the phone, then disconnected.
"Hasn't quite recovered from the last trip, then?" the Doctor said wryly.
Sarah softened her words with a smile. "He's just a little worried about the idea of going missing again for an extended period." The Doctor winced and Sarah hurried to reassure him. "Don't worry about it. He explained it all away."
"Just doesn't want to have to do it again," the Doctor said.
"Well," Sarah said. She looked into his eyes and then chuckled. After a second, so did he.
"Alright, then," he said. "It's just the three of us. Avanti! I'm starving." And he turned and, draping one arm over Martha's shoulders, and the other over Sarah's, shepherded them into the TARDIS.
When they stepped out of the TARDIS, Sarah found herself on an alien planet for the first time in three decades. She turned slowly through three hundred and sixty degrees, taking it all in--the pink sky with the purple clouds, the gleaming buildings, the tang of alien air, the skycars jetting above her, the people, people not just of a variety of races and colors, but a variety of species, who mixed and mingled on the slidewalk before her. Before the grin could even begin to leave her face, the Doctor had taken her hand and Martha's and they had all three stepped onto the slidewalk.
They stepped off again in a minute and entered one of the softly glittering buildings. The Doctor led them to a podium where something--Sarah wasn't sure what--waited for them. She exchanged a glance with Martha and saw that the younger woman was just as baffled as she was.
"Step in," the Doctor said encouragingly.
"Step into what?"
"The pod," he answered, and proceeded to step up into nothing and have a seat.
"Ooo-kaaaay," Sarah said. She took his extended hand, raised her foot, stepped on nothing, and climbed up into nothing. She seated herself gingerly on nothing, prepared to stand back up instantly if the Doctor said there was no seat there, but he just nodded and then turned to help Martha up into the pod. As soon as she was comfortably seated on nothing, the pod floated off to an unoccupied corner of the restaurant.
"This is different," Martha said with a grin and a bit of a nervous giggle.
"Oh good," Sarah said. "I thought maybe you were a regular here." She looked around and saw other diners, of a variety of species, sizes, colors and number and nature of appendages, floating gently around the interior space, looking much like they were ensconced in invisible bubbles.
"LIke it?" the Doctor grinned.
"I love it," Sarah said. She blew out a breath. "And to think. There was a time when I took all this for granted. 'Ho hum, another alien planet'," she said, gently mocking her younger self.
"I don't think you ever got quite that blase," the Doctor said, looking at her fondly. "Maybe a little less wide-eyed is all."
"When did you travel with the Doctor?" Martha asked.
"Oh. A lifetime ago," Sarah answered. "Probably before you were born."
"Can we order before we talk?" the Doctor interrupted.
"Of course," Sarah said. She looked around the nothingness that surrounded them. "Are there menus?"
"No. I'll be ordering for you," the Doctor said.
Martha and Sarah Jane exchanged glances, and Sarah Jane was glad to see they were on the same page with this one. "Bit old fashioned of you, don't you think?" she asked with some asperity.
He tucked his chin in and gave her a look out of the tops of his eyes. "I'm the only telepath in the pod. I'm the only one who can order."
"Oh." Sarah and Martha exchanged a shamefaced look and then they both laughed. Sarah glanced around the room again and noticed this time that none of the other diners were speaking. "Are we going to disturb everyone if we talk?" she asked, as quietly as she could.
The Doctor smiled reassuringly at her. "No. They're very tolerant of off-worlders here."
"Where is here, anyway?" Martha asked.
"Metebelis 5," the Doctor answered.
Sarah's eyebrows flew up. "Metebelis? But that's where...." She trailed off, remembering the condition he was in when he returned from Metebelis 3 after going missing for weeks in the void, too sick with radiation poisoning to find his way back to UNIT HQ. The TARDIS had brought him back, finally, just in time for her to witness the miracle of a Time Lord regenerating.
The Doctor shook his head. "That was Metebelis 3. This is Metebelis 5." He gave her a dire look and shuddered. "I haven't been back to Metebelis 3 since..." He didn't finish the sentence, just looked at her, the painful memory clear in his eyes.
No one spoke for a long moment, until Sarah became aware of Martha, looking back and forth between them with a baffled air. She turned to the younger woman. "I'm sorry," she said. "Didn't mean to bring up ancient history."
Martha laughed weakly. "You two obviously go back." Her brown eyes were guarded as she looked at Sarah, then filled with liquid longing when she turned them on the Doctor.
And Sarah knew.
She turned briskly to the Doctor. "Why don't you go ahead and order. We probably wouldn't know anything that was on the menu even if you tried to describe it to us."
The Doctor closed his eyes for a moment, and almost immediately four plates whizzed into their pod. They looked like frisbees, upside-down and packed with food. One large one landed in the center of the nothingness that lay in front of them, while the three smaller ones skidded to a halt, one in front of each of them.
The Doctor reached out with a long arm, lifted the plate from the center of the table, and offered it to Sarah. "Hors d'oeuvre?" he asked politely.
Sarah looked down at the plate, then up at him. "They're wiggling," she said with a snort of laughter.
"That's good. Means they're fresh," he said. Sarah helped herself to one, and the Doctor passed the plate to Martha.
She stared at them in horror. "They're alive."
"Well," he said, wrinkling his nose. "So are chips. And you eat them."
She stared at him. "Chips are not alive."
He compressed his lips and looked at her. "If you planted the potato instead of chopping it up and frying it, it would grow."
She looked at him, then at the wiggling hors d'oeuvres. "But a potato is a plant."
"So's this," the Doctor said, popping one into his mouth and chewing.
"Plants don't wiggle," Martha said.
"Yes they do," Sarah said. When Martha looked at her, she elaborated. "Phototropism. Plants move in response to light. Bit more slowly than this on Earth, but still..." She had been examining the bit of wiggling food she had taken. It was a grass-green color, cylindrical, and looked as if it had tubules running the length of it. She popped it into her mouth, swallowed, and giggled. "Tickles," she said when they looked at her, Martha's eyes appalled, the Doctor's amused.
"Sarah. You're supposed to chew them," the Doctor chided. "You don't get the flavor if you swallow them whole."
"Yes, but they don't tickle on the way down if you chew them," she said, helping herself to another. This time she chewed it, thoughtfully, then looked at the Doctor. "You're right. Much better." Then she grinned mischievously. "But less fun."
Martha looked from one to the other of them, then hesitantly reached out and took one of the hors d'oeuvres. "You're sure this isn't a live animal that's going to feel me biting into it?"
The Doctor nodded. "No nerve endings. No brain. Just...plant. Kind of like alien celery." He looked thoughtful. "Wonder if it would work like celery?"
Sarah reminded herself to ask him later what he meant by celery working, but she was too busy watching Martha and eating to worry about it at the moment. Martha had delicately placed the chunk of wiggling alien celery in her mouth, then jumped and looked at them, wide-eyed.
"Chew," the Doctor encouraged her.
"Or just swallow it," Sarah said.
Martha opted to chew. Her face went through some remarkable contortions, then relaxed into a "meh" look. "Not bad," she said.
"Try one my way," Sarah encouraged her.
"Wait," the Doctor said, reaching into his inside coat pocket and pulling out his sonic screwdriver. "If you're going to go for the tickle, let's really get them moving." He aimed the sonic at the plate and a blue beam shot out. The bits of food started wiggling in triple time. Sarah grinned and reached for one, popped it in her mouth, swallowed and laughed happily.
"Much better!" she said, grinning at the Doctor. "You and that sonic screwdriver. Never run out of uses for it."
He flashed her a cheeky grin, flipped his screwdriver end over end in the air and caught it handily, then stashed it back in his pocket.
Martha and Sarah helped themselves to a few more hors d'oeuvres while the Doctor took a bite of the food on the plate in front of him. Sarah turned to ask him what the three main dishes were, but the words froze on her lips when she saw him.
His eyes were bugged out so far that the whites showed clearly all around the irises. His face was bright red, shading to purple in spots, freckles standing out in sharp relief. His mouth was hanging open and he didn't seem to be breathing.
Martha looked up at him just then, too. "Oh my God. He's choking." He shook his head, but she didn't notice as she tried to leap to her feet to get behind him and administer a Heimlich. Unfortunately, Sarah thought as she watched, leaping to your feet in a pod full of invisible structures doesn't always give the intended results.
"Martha. I don't think he can choke," Sarah said, reaching out and trying to calm the girl.
"What do you mean? Of course he can choke."
Sarah shook her head. "He has a respiratory bypass system." She addressed the Doctor directly. "You're not choking, are you?"
He shook his head forcefully as beads of sweat popped out on his forehead.
"Then what's wrong? What do you need us to do?"
He shook his head again, then held up a long index finger and closed his eyes.
"Phwoo," he finally said with a huff of air. "That. Was. Amazing." He reached into his top pocket, pulled out a handkerchief, and mopped his face.
Sarah and Martha exchanged glances, then looked back at him. "You're okay?" Sarah asked.
"Better than okay," he said. "That is far and away the best angfwatfwa I have ever tasted! Had to send my compliments to the chef."
Sarah thought for a second, then twigged. "Ah. that's what the..." She closed her eyes and held up her index finger for a second as he had done. "...was about."
He nodded.
"You could have told us," Martha said.
He shook his head. "Oh no. Had to do it while I was fully experiencing the flavor so he'd know exactly what his food was doing to my taste buds." He blew out another breath of extreme appreciation.
"Well, are you going to share?" Sarah asked with mock exasperation.
He looked askance at her. "I don't know. Not sure human taste buds can handle it."
"Oh, not that again after all these years." Sarah laughed.
He grinned. "Oh alright. But don't blame me if it's too much for you." He scooped up a small sample of it, and fed it to Sarah.
She felt her eyes and face going through the same contortions she'd seen his go through, the only difference being that she put a hand up to cover her mouth rather than just letting it hang open.
The Doctor laughed. "Good?" She nodded, and felt the sweat springing out of her pores. "Want me to tell the chef?" She nodded again, and he reached over with a grin, gently placed his long fingers on the sides of her face, and closed his eyes. After a few seconds, he dropped his hands from her face and opened his eyes.
Still unable to speak, she nodded at Martha. "Martha?" asked the Doctor in response. "Want to try some?"
"What did you just do?" she asked, instead of answering him directly.
"When?" he asked.
"Just now. When you put your hands on her face."
The Doctor looked at Sarah, who was now waving her hand in front of her mouth. "Sent her compliments to the chef.
"But...it was like what you did in Bedlam. To that man."
The Doctor thought a second, then nodded. "It was. More or less. I went into his mind to bring back his memories." He nodded toward Sarah Jane. "I went into her mind so I could tell the chef how much she was enjoying the food."
"Oh," Martha said, looking at him with that look Sarah remembered so well, that look she knew had been on her own face so many times when she was first trying to get her mind around exactly who this Doctor person was. She felt a momentary pang of jealousy for this young woman who had that whole adventure in front of her, the adventure of getting to know this remarkable being they called the Doctor. But then, she thought, he hasn't stopped surprising me yet.
"Bedlam?" she said, finally able to speak again, as the Doctor fed Martha a taste of his angfwatfwa. "You're going to have to tell me that story. Is that the name of a planet, or do you mean our Bedlam?"
"Yours, unfortunately," the Doctor answered, his face growing grim. Then he had to smile as he watched Martha's reaction to the food. "Want me to tell the chef?" he asked, starting to reach toward her before she could answer.
She leaned back slightly, hand over her mouth, and shook her head.
"Oh," he said, leaning back himself and sounding slightly deflated.
"You tell him for her," Sarah suggested, and he nodded, closed his eyes for a second, then smiled.
The dishes that had landed in front of Sarah and Martha were not quite as dramatically taste-bud exploding as the angfwatfwa, but they were still remarkably good and excitingly exotic. They all exchanged samples, Martha's eyes sparkling as she fed the Doctor a bite from the plate that had landed in front of her. They decided the Doctor could keep the angfwatfwa, as being the best able to handle it, while the humans enjoyed the other dishes.
Too soon, they had cleaned their Frisbees (as Sarah couldn't help thinking of them, as they flew themselves away back to wherever they'd come from) and were sipping the after-dinner drinks the Doctor had ordered for them. Sarah had been brought up to date, in a reader's-digest way, on Martha's adventures with the Doctor, and had shared a few of her own. It was, she thought as she glanced around the room, all-in-all, the best lunch date she'd ever had.
"Wish Harry would have come," she said. "I don't know how I'll ever be able to describe this to him."
"Take a picture. Send it to him," the Doctor said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"With what?" she asked. "I didn't think to bring a camera."
"Use Martha's phone," he said. "Martha?"
"Oh, of course," Martha said, digging in her pocket and handing her mobile across the table to Sarah.
She looked at it, then looked at the Doctor. He just returned her gaze expectantly. "You know how to take pictures with a mobile?" he finally asked.
"Yes, I do," she said. "But what's the point when we're a few galaxies away from the nearest tower?"
"Oh, don't worry about that. He set me up with universal roaming," Martha said.
Sarah looked at her, eyes wide. "Seriously." Martha nodded. Sarah looked down at the phone, then up at the Doctor. "Who gets the bill?"
He grinned. "Don't worry about it."
She flipped the phone open, keyed in Harry's number, put the phone to her ear and waited. "Harry?" She laughed. "Harry! You'll never believe where I am! Hang on, I'll show you." She shot a few pictures of the restaurant, Martha and the Doctor, then sent them to Harry. "Did those come through?" She paused and her jaw dropped. "Does that look like Bannerman Road?" she asked sarcastically, giving her companions an amazed look and shaking her head in disbelief. "No, I'm still with the Doctor. And Martha. On Metebelis 5." She paused, listening again. "You'd have to ask him that. All I did was dial." She shook her head again with an affectionate smile. "Okay. Talk to you later. Who knows from where!" She disconnected, handed the phone back to Martha, and laughed. "Now that's something we didn't have in the old days."
"So," Martha asked, a bit too casually. "Is Harry your boyfriend?"
Sarah stopped laughing, thought for a moment, then frowned. "Could I have an easier question?"
"That one's hard?" Martha said.
Sarah nodded. The Doctor gave her a warm smile and then laughed softly. "I know some great honeymoon planets..." he started to say, a twinkle in his brown eyes.
"Don't push it," she interrupted him, eyes flashing a warning. "It's not easy, finding your way out of a thirty-year friendship and into...something else."
"I think Harry would find it very easy," the Doctor said.
"Well, I'm not Harry, am I?"
He laughed, then looked her up and down appreciatively. "No. I don't think I've ever mistaken the two of you. Doubt I ever will."