A/N I do not own Doctor Who (although I'm holding out on the dream that I will work for the show one day), only my OC Molly Green, and any other characters you don't recognise. This is my first published work so it may not be very good, but I hope you enjoy it, and I hope I've made Molly as good a character as I can. For context, this is set between 'The End of the World' and 'The Unquiet Dead'. Thanks and, again, I hope you enjoy reading it!
Prologue
"Now that's interesting," the Doctor said aloud, narrowing his eyes slightly.
Leaning back on the TARDIS console, he held his psychic paper up to the green light cast by the rotor in the centre of room, a frown creasing the already-prominent lines of his face as he squinted at it. His companion, Rose Tyler, looked up from where she'd been lounging in the chair beside the console, a now-familiar feeling blossoming in her gut. A week ago, when she'd first joined him on his travels through time and space, she would've felt perhaps less nervous than she did now, naïve enough to believe he would never intentionally or even accidentally lead them into trouble. But now, now she was wiser, and she knew what the phrase, 'That's interesting,' meant when it was uttered by the Time Lord himself. It meant conflict, danger, and a hell of a lot of running.
But, on the other hand…
"What? What is it?" she asked, circling round to join him, stretching her neck over his shoulder to see what had caught his interest.
"That's very interesting," he repeated, apparently deaf to her question, "Extremely interesting, actually. I didn't think anyone… well, it's a big universe I s'pose…"
Instead of answering her questioning look, he pulled the small screen fixed to the TARDIS towards him and flourished his psychic paper at it, dragging it down the screen so that it emitted a high-pitched beep, almost like scanning a barcode. At once, the TARDIS shuddered and shifted, as a string of odd symbols, composed of geometrically intricate circles and shapes flickered into view on the screen. To Rose, they were completely undecipherable, but the Doctor seemed to understand them at once.
"That's impossible," he muttered, grabbing the screen with both hands, and tilting it closer, as though the distance would change the symbols into something that would make more sense to him, "That can't be true. Unless… Could it? Could well be…"
Rose sighed at his continued mutters and grabbed the paper from where he'd left in on the console to look at it herself. She didn't expect to see anything- it was always blank to her, after all. But, not for the first time since she'd been travelling with the Doctor, she was proved wrong.
Scrawled across the usually blank rectangle in bold letters were the simple words:
Help me.
Molly.
"Who's Molly?" she asked, interrupting his increasingly manic train-of-thought as she turned to look up at him, "Friend of yours?"
He shook his head; whether it was to answer her question or simply out of confusion she didn't know.
"Okay," she said, slowly, "Whoever she is, how can she be sending messages to you?"
"It's psychic, so it can receive messages from all over the universe via telepathic communication," he explained as he continued to look at the screen in amazement, "Didn't think there'd be anyone who'd know to contact me using this," and he nodded at the psychic paper still clutched in her fingers, "I'm meant to be off the grid."
"You're not doing a very good job at it. You keep making too much trouble," she replied, grinning lightly before asking, "So, this Molly."
She stressed the syllables almost seductively, glancing up to see if he reacted. Which he didn't.
"It's not a very alien name, is it?" she pressed on, abandoning her teasing, "That means she's from Earth, right?"
"Could be," he shrugged, taking the paper off her and finally putting it back into the pocket of his leather jacket as he faced her, "I tracked the coordinates from where it was sent and it came up as Earth, early 21st Century."
He gestured at the strange images on the screen, at last giving them some explanation, though this relief was undermined by the next tantalising remark, "And that makes it more unusual."
"How come?" she frowned, moving aside to let him fiddle absent-mindedly with the console. Maybe one day, he'd actually teach her how to fly it.
"Well, to send telepathic messages like that requires incredibly advanced psychic ability," he told her as he moved around the TARDIS, "A human being couldn't have that, it's impossible, not even if they trained for, I dunno... a thousand years?"
"Right," she nodded, cottoning onto his thought process, "So, there's someone, or something, on Earth, not human, but using a human name, who's sending you a call for help?"
He met her gaze from across the console and flashed a bright smile at her.
"Brilliant, isn't it?" he said, "Alien life form on Earth and it's catfishing me."
"So, we're going to find it, yeah?" she asked, brown eyes glinting at the prospect of another venture into the unknown, "Find whatever sent it?"
"Seems like it'd be rude not to, when she's asked us for help," he agreed, starting to pick up speed as he moved around the TARDIS, evidently starting up the TARDIS so it was ready to take off.
Choosing to ignore his use of the word 'she' to describe the unknown entity, Rose watched him with a rather fond expression on her face. Sometimes, she still couldn't believe she'd chosen to run away with this crazy man in his phone box. But oh, was she glad she had.
He was now dashing around as he prepared them to leave, flicking switches and pressing buttons, as he declared loudly, "Wherever or whoever this Molly is, we're gonna find her."
He sprang to the left of the console and pulled the final lever, and the machine began to make the familiar whirring, groaning sound, tilting and tossing them about like a ship caught in a storm as they sped across time and space once more.
"And if we can," he sent Rose another wide smile which she returned, "We're gonna help her."