Chapter LXI

Mira's POV

It had been a mistake to ask Martha along, using her as a distraction only because she herself didn't have the guts to finally put straight what was between her and the Doctor. To finally tell him that there was nothing, they were still only companions and apologise for that stupid kiss. But no, instead of doing that, she had to ask if Martha could accompany them, despite – or maybe just because of – knowing that Martha had a serious crush on him.

Apart from all that, what had he wanted to tell her? She would probably never find it out now.

"But how do you travel in time? What makes it go?" Martha asked, holding tight to one of the handrails and pulling her out of her thoughts.

Had Rose ever asked how it was working? Maybe earlier, before she had met her.

"Oh, let's take the fun and mystery out of everything. Martha, you don't want to know. It just does," the Doctor replied, pressing some buttons. "Hold on tight."

The next moment, the shaking stopped so suddenly that Martha fell to the floor, whilst she herself only made a step to the side to regain her balance. The fleeting thought about how much time of her life she had spend on spaceships crossed her mind. Probably more than on planets. Where were they anyway?

"Blimey. Do you have to pass a test to fly this thing?" Martha said now and got up again.

"Yes, and I failed it," the Doctor replied, whilst running through the console room in a hurry. He really seemed to be quite serious about Martha coming along only for one trip. And he seemed to be determined to get it over with as fast as possible. "Now, make the most of it. I promised you one trip, and one trip only. Outside this door, brave new world."

"Where are we?" Martha asked, and for a moment Mira was filled with the excitement and curiosity she could feel coming from her.

"Take a look," the Doctor said with a smile. "After you."

After a moment of hesitation, Martha walked over to the door and opened it. Immediately, the console room was filled with the outside noise. Chatter, sounds of animals and of work carried out. English, wasn't it? They must still be on Earth then, at least she could feel no alien presence apart from the TARDIS in her mind. Then she caught a glimpse over Martha's shoulder. Indeed, it was Earth. Middle Ages? No, later. Maybe late Tudor?

"Oh, you are kidding me. You are so kidding me," Martha said with her head out of the door. "Oh, my God, we did it. We travelled in time. Where are we? No, sorry. I got to get used to this whole new language. When are we?"

"Mind out," the Doctor, who was directly behind her, said and suddenly pulled her back. Not a moment too late, as someone emptied a bucket with rather unpleasant contents from an upstairs window, shouting something. "Somewhere before the invention of the toilet. Sorry about that," the Doctor explained.

"I've seen worse. I've worked the late night shift A+E. But are we safe? I mean, can we move around and stuff?" Martha asked.

"Maybe better not tell them something about your time, or you might end up at the stake, burned as a witch. Or get sectioned," she said and followed the two of them, closing the door behind her.

"Of course we can," the Doctor said, striding along with his hands in his pockets, looking absolutely misplaced in his suit and coat. Just as Martha and herself, wearing trousers. "Why do you ask?"

"It's like in the films. You step on a butterfly, you change the future of the human race," Martha replied.

"It's actually not that easy," she said now. "It takes a bit more than to kill a single butterfly. Time is surprisingly stable in itself. Mostly." She decided to ignore the puzzled look the Doctor shot her. He still didn't seem to fully believe her when she was talking about time and the way she was able to perceive it.

"Really? How do you know that? You're from Earth, aren't you?" Martha asked.

"Yes. Future. Studied it, sort of. He still doesn't quite believe it," she said, nodding at the Doctor, "But actually humanity will become able to deal with the mathematics of time travel. And I'm intentionally saying that we'll deal with it, not understand it, but-"

"Tell you what then, just don't step on any butterflies," the Doctor interrupted her. "What have butterflies ever done to you?" he turned around, walked backwards for a few yards and looked at Martha.

"What if, I don't know, what if I kill my grandfather?" Martha didn't let go of that topic.

"Are you planning to?" the Doctor asked.

"No."

"Well, then," he said and that seemed the end of this topic for him.

"And this is London?" Martha asked.

"Tudor time?" she added.

"I think so," he said to Martha and then turned his head to Mira. "Technically not. Practically the very last years of Elizabeth Tudor. Round about 1599. Makes it the Elizabethan England. Just a few steps further away from the Dark Ages then the Tudor England was."

"What a shame. I had hoped to meet Henry the Eighth himself. And Anne Boleyn," she murmured.

"Why Anne Boleyn?" the Doctor asked.

"Well, why not? Just to see what was so special about her that the King of England not only wanted a divorce, but even broke with the church for that. All that for a woman. Can we meet her some day? Please."

"Uhm, well-"

"Oh, but hold on," Martha suddenly interrupted them, seemingly shocked. "Am I all right? I'm not going to get carted off as a slave, am I?"

"Why would they do that?" the Doctor asked.

Yes, why? Mira wasn't getting it as well. No one seemed interested in them, despite their clothes.

"Not exactly white, in case you haven't noticed."

Oh, right.

"I'm not even human," the Doctor replied with a shrug. "Just walk about like you own the place. Works for me. Besides, you'd be surprised. Elizabethan England, not so different from your time. Look over there. They've got recycling," he said and nodded to a man who was shovelling horse manure into a bucket. "Water cooler moment."

They were walking by two man talking at a water barrel, then reached a preacher, saying, "And the world will be consumed by flame."

Actually - at least parts of it - more than once.

"Global warming," the Doctor commented. "Oh, yes, and entertainment. Popular entertainment for the masses. If I'm right, we're just down the river by Southwark, right next to..." He suddenly took both of them by the hand and ran around a corner, over some Bridge, past a Cathedral, "Oh, yes, the Globe Theatre! Brand new. Just opened. Through, strictly speaking, it's not a globe, it's a tetra-decagon. Fourteen sides. Containing the man himself."

Shakespeare?

"Whoa, you don't mean. Is Shakespeare in there?" Martha had the idea as well.

"Oh, yes. Miss Rhodan, Miss Jones, will you accompany me to the theatre?" he asked and offered them both an arm.

She wondered for a moment what the other people would think of them, with him having a woman at each side.

"When you get home, you can tell everyone you've seen Shakespeare," he said to Martha.

"Then I could get sectioned," she replied.

Martha's POV

They had watched the performance between all the ordinary folk in the theatre. No one had minded them, even though they must really stick out. Now the folk was applauding the actors.

"That's amazing! Just amazing. It's worth putting up with the smell. And those are men dressed as women, yeah?"

"London never changes," the Doctor said casually.

"Where's Shakespeare? I want to see Shakespeare," she said. It would be so cool to actually see Shakespeare himself. "Author! Author!" she started to shout but then stopped to ask the Doctor, "Do people shout that? Do they shout Author?"

"Author! Author!" a man behind her started to shout, and soon enough the crowd fell in.

"Well, they do now," the Doctor said after looking around.

But before she could think about influencing history, a man came onto the stage. There was no doubt, it could only be him.

"He's a bit different from his portraits," she noted.

"Yeah, they always edited pictures, that's not a new thing to do," Mira, who was standing next to her, said.

She shot a short look to the other woman. Mira seemed to be a quite nice person. Was she really from her future? How far in the future? At least she tried to explain things to her, when the Doctor just said she should simply believe it. And she liked her dry humour.

"Genius. He's a genius. The genius," the Doctor, standing on her other side, said. "The most human human there's ever been. Now we're going to hear him speak. Always he chooses the best words. New, beautiful, brilliant words."

And indeed, Shakespeare finally chose to speak. But his choice of words was rather questionable, at least the Doctor would have said that. "Ah, shut your big fat mouths!" he said, causing the crowd to laugh.

"Oh, well,! She heard the Doctor say, slightly disappointed.

"You should never meet your heroes," she said sympathetic, and couldn't help but smile as she heard Mira saying, "I like him already!"

"You've got excellent taste, I'll give you that. Oh, that's a wig," Shakespeare said and pointed in the crowd. "I know what you're all saying. Loves Labour's Lost, that's a funny ending, isn't it? It just stops. Will the boys get the girls? Well, don't get your hose in a tangle, you'll find out soon. Yeah, yeah. All in good time. You don't rush a genius." He stopped speaking for a moment and looked into space, his face somehow blank. "When?" he continued, "Tomorrow night. The premiere of my brand new play. A sequel, no less, and I call it Loves Labour's Won."

He went off the stage and the people started to leave as well, leaving her, the Doctor and Mira no choice but to follow them.

"Love Labour's Won? Never heard that. At least in my universe he didn't write that one. I mean, there were rumours, but...," she heard Mira say.

In her universe? What was that supposed to mean now?

"Well, I'm not an expert, but at least I've never heard of Loves Labour's Won," she said and looked to the Doctor, who was walking now in in the middle between her and Mira.

"Exactly. The lost play. It doesn't exist, only in rumours. It's mentioned in lists of his plays but never ever turns up. And no one knows why," he responded.

"Have you got a mini-disc or something?" she suddenly asked, having a weird thought crossing her mind, "We can tape it. We can flog it. Sell it when we get home and make a mint."

"No," the Doctor simply said, making her immediately understand how stupid that idea was.

"That would be bad," she said.

"Yeah, yeah," he said, looking at her in a way that made her heart skip a beat. Almost.

"Well, how come it disappeared in the first place?" she asked.

"Well, I was just going to give you a quick little trip in the TARDIS, but I suppose we could stay a bit longer."


Mira's POV

She followed the Doctor to an Inn. She quite liked the idea of spending more time here, in Elizabethan England. It just was a shame that they hadn't changed their clothes – they were sticking out, even though no one seemed to mind it. But she herself would have liked it much better to be dressed appropriately. Apart from that, it really was a good thing Martha was here. Not only had she proven herself rather clever, but also the chances that she would end up somewhere alone with him were much lower. So no more room for awkward conversations. Or, more specifically, awkward attempts to have even more awkward conversations. She just couldn't help thinking like that, even though she really felt bad by now for using Martha like that.

Quite rightfully feeling bad.

Martha even seemed to like her. Yet.

Inside the Inn, they went up to a room – the Doctor seemed to know exactly where to go. She could already hear voices, one of them being Shakespeare's.

"Hello!" the Doctor said and stuck his head through the door. "Excuse me, not interrupting, am I? Mister Shakespeare, isn't it?"

"Oh, no. No, no, no," Shakespeare said, visibly annoyed. "Who let you in? No autographs. No, you can't have yourself sketched with me. And please don't ask where I get my ideas from. Thanks for the interest. Now be a good boy and shove-" But before he could finish the sentence, his eyes turned to her, glided over her body and then focused on a pointe behind her, just where Martha was standing. "Hey, nonny nonny," he continued, not so annoyed any more. "Sit right down here next to me. You two get sewing on them costumes," he waved at the men who were in the room with him, "Off you go."

"Come on, lads," a woman, probably the owner of the Inn, said, "I think our William's found his new muse."

"Sweet lady," Shakespeare said to Martha as they were sitting down on the table, now alone with him, "Such unusual clothes. So fitted."

"Er, verily, forsooth, egads," Martha said, causing not only her face, but the Doctor's face as well to drop.

"No, no, don't do that. Don't," he hurried to say.

Meanwhile, she had mustered Shakespeare closer. There was something about him, something catching, charming, but that was not it. He was psychic, wasn't he? She could clearly sense it, now that she was so close to him. It wasn't very strong, and most likely he wasn't even aware of it – how could he, how could anyone be, as long as no one told them that the other people weren't like them – or it was simply still latent, not fully developed yet, lying dormant under the surface of his brilliant mind.

Just then she saw out of the corner of her eye how the Doctor produced his psychic paper. Bad idea, she thought, really bad idea. But before she could stop him, he was showing it to Shakespeare.

"I'm Sir Doctor of TARDIS and this is my companion, Miss Martha Jones. Oh, and Lady Mira of TARDIS."

"Interesting," Shakespeare said, "that bit of paper. It's blank."

"Oh, that's very clever," the Doctor said in admiration, "That proves it. Absolute genius."

"No, it says so right there," Martha insisted and pointed at the psychic paper, "Sir Doctor, Lady Mira, Martha Jones. It says so."

"And I say it's blank," Shakespeare said.

"Martha, he got it," she said to Martha in an attempt to save her that humiliation. "No need to pretend."

"Psychic paper," the Doctor said, absolutely oblivious to her attempts. "Er, long story. Oh, I hate starting from scratch," he added, rubbing his eye.

"Psychic? Never heard that before and words are my trade. Who are you exactly? More's the point, who is your delicious blackamoor lady?"

"What did you say?" Martha said, totally shocked.

All too understandable, no one would use a word like that any more. But right now, she was not in her time, and Shakespeare had a few more words like that in store, as he instantly proved.

"Oops. Isn't that a word we use nowadays? An Ethiop girl? A swart? A Queen of Afric?"

"I can't believe I'm hearing this," Martha said in so much disbelief that she felt truly sorry for her.

"It's political correctness gone mad," the Doctor now intervened. "Er, Martha's from a far-off land. Freedonia."

Before the situation could get even more embarrassing, they got interrupted by a man who literally burst into the room. He was wearing expensive clothes and had a golden chain of office around his neck. One didn't need to be an empath to tell how enraged he was.

"Excuse me!" he started to speak without greeting, "Hold hard a moment. This is abominable behaviour. A new play with no warning? I demand to see a script, Mister Shakespeare. As Master of the Revels, every new script must be registered at my office and examined by me before it can be performed."

For a moment, the whole scene seemed outright surreal to her. There was a man, dressed as if jumped right out of an old painting, speaking as in some old play, to the man himself, Shakespeare. Well, she had already dealt with Queen Victoria, but somehow that had been different. Plus, she always had had a fable for that particular time and the Tudors. And even though it was basically Elizabethan England and no longer the England of Henry the Eighth, she still was fascinated by it.

"Tomorrow morning, first thing, I'll send it round," Shakespeare said to the man.

"I don't work to your schedule, you work to mine. The script, now!"

"I can't," Shakespeare replied, all calm.

"Then tomorrow's performance is cancelled."

Out of the corner of her eyes she noticed that the maid who had been cleaning the floor left, but she was too captured by the conversation to pay any attention to it.

"It's all go around here, isn't it?" Martha asked quietly.

"I'm returning to my office for a banning order. If it's the last thing I do, Love's Labours Won will never be played," the ma said and stormed out of the room.

"Well then, mystery solved," Martha said, speaking out loud what she herself was thinking. "That's Love's Labours Won over and done with. Thought it might be something more, you know, more mysterious-"

Suddenly, she heard a man's scream from the street, followed by the scream of a woman. By then, she already was on her feed, heading for the door, regretting once more that she didn't have a weapon.

Outside she was joined by the Doctor and Martha. They all watched a man who was spewing quite large amounts of water. It seemed almost as if he was drowning, but how? There was no open water here, just a barrel. And somehow she doubted that he had put his head in there whilst taking a deep breath.

"It's that Master of the Revels bloke," Martha said.

"What's wrong with him?" the Doctor asked and had already started to approach the guy. "Leave it to me. I'm a doctor," he said to the people who were standing and staring in shock.

"So am I," she heard Martha say, "Near enough."

Well, fine. She herself had promoted in some areas, but unfortunately never in medicine. But she had substantial theoretical knowledge and practice in first aid.

But before they could reach the guy, he collapsed on the floor. Dead.

"Got to get the heart going," Martha said. Hey, Mister, come on. Can you hear me? You're going to be all right."

She was about to clear his airways as water gushed out. A lot of it.

"What the hell is that?" Martha asked.

"I've never seen a death like it," the Doctor, crouching next to her, said. "His lungs are full of water. He drowned and then, I don't know, like a blow to the heart, an invisible blow." He looked at the man for a few more seconds, before addressing the woman from the Inn, "Good mistress, this poor fellow has died from a sudden imbalance of the humours. A natural if unfortunate demise. Call a constable and have him taken away."

"Yes, sir," she confirmed.

"I'll do it, ma'am," the woman who had cleaned the floor earlier said and left, without waiting for an answer.

"And why are you telling them that?" Martha wanted to know.

"This lot still have got one foot in the Dark Ages. If I tell them the truth, they'll panic and think it was witchcraft," he replied.

"Okay, what was it then?" Martha asked.

"Witchcraft," she said, together with the Doctor.


Martha's POV

They had went back into the room with Shakespeare and the woman from the Inn. All the time she had to think about what Mira and the Doctor were meaning with witchcraft. There was no such thing, was it? But, on the other hand, there was time travel and aliens. So why not witchcraft?

"I got you a room, Sir Doctor. You, Madam Mira and Miss Jones are just across the landing."

"Poor Lynley," Shakespeare sighed. "So many strange events. Not least of all, this land of Freedonia where a woman can be a doctor?"

"Where a woman can do what she likes," she replied with a smile. By now she was over the names he had called her. He obviously hadn't meant to insult here, and he was quite charming. Not as charming as the Doctor, but hey, he was Shakespeare.

"And you, Sir Doctor. How can a man so young have eyes so old?" he addressed the Doctor now. Did he know? No, no way. How could he?

"I do a lot of reading," the Doctor simply said.

"A trite reply," Shakespeare said. "Yeah, that's what I'd do. And you?" he turned his head to her again, "You look at him like you're surprised he exists. He's as much of a puzzle to you as he is to me. And you, Lady Mira? Such fair skin and eyes as clear as ice. I only hope your heart is not as frozen yet as your eyes appear to be. You must be far away from home?"

Okay, now it was getting weird. A bit too weird for her taste.

"I think we should say goodnight," she said and left, hoping the Doctor and Mira would follow her.

She reached the room and had just lid a candle as her two companions entered as well.

"It's not exactly five star, is it?" she said with a smile.

The bed was rather small, the floor was wooden, and the wall hanging had definitely seen better times. There was a wardrobe as well as a small table with a bowl on it with some water and a small mirror leaning against the wall.

"Oh, it'll do. I've seen worse," the Doctor replied.

"Let's just hope there're no fleas here," Mira said. "Flea bites itch for weeks."

"Do you really think here are fleas? Great. And I haven't even got a toothbrush."

"Oh. Er," the Doctor said and began to search in his pockets until he produced a toothbrush. "Contains Venusian spearmint."

"So, who's going where?" she said as she grabbed the toothbrush. They weren't supposed to share it, were they? "I mean, there's only one bed."

"We'll manage. Come on," he said and hopped on the bed.

"I'm not going in the middle," Mira said. "I don't like that. Makes me feel claustrophobic."

She turned her head and saw the other woman sitting on the small chair at the table. She had taken off her jacket, and with the black t-shirt she was wearing Martha could see now that she wasn't that skinny. Well, she was, but she also had quite defined arms and didn't look as if starving any minute. Now she was pulling hairpins out of her hair, placing them on the table. She looked back from Mira to the Doctor, who seemed to watch Mira opening her hair with some fascination.

"So, magic and stuff. That's a surprise. It's all a little bit Harry Potter," she said, still standing in the middle of the room, between the bed and the table.

"Wait till you read book seven. Oh, I cried," the Doctor said.

"But is it real, though? I mean, witches, black magic and all that, it's real?"

"Course it isn't!" the Doctor replied, as if talking to a child that had just asked if elephants could fly.

Before she could answer anything, she heard Mira sigh.

"Sometimes he has an incredible lack of fantasy," the other woman said, obviously being finished with the hairpins. She brushed her hair with her fingers, and now Martha could see how long it really was, as well as that it most likely was her own hair.

"What!?" the Doctor said so indignant that it almost sounded funny.

"Oh, come on," Mira said. "Witchcraft and the art of magic is nothing more but a way to channel psychic energy. It doesn't matter how you call it in the end. Humans have tried it for- well, for ever. Some more successfully than others."

"Nah. It only looks like witchcraft, at least to the people of that time, but it isn't. Witchcraft doesn't exist. Can't be. Are you two going to stand there all night?"

Well, good question actually. Mira had stood up as well by know and was braiding her hair into a simple braid.

"Budge up a bit, then," she said, decided to take a chance, "Sorry, there's not much room. All of us here, same bed. Tongues will wag."

"There's such a thing as psychic energy-" the Doctor said thoughtfully, and moved a bit more in the middle of the bed, making room for her.

"Such a thing? Oh, don't you say," Mira mumbled.

"But a human couldn't channel it like that-" he continued unperturbedly.

"I said it, lack of fantasy," Mira said unimpressed, causing him to flinch.

"Channel it like that without a generator the size of Taunton and I think we'd have spotted that," he continued, raising an eyebrow.

His eyes were still locked on her, Martha could see. Suddenly she realised it. Maybe they weren't together any more, for whatever reasons – but, in fact, that was just what they were trying to convince themselves of. They only would have to watch themselves; they were still behaving like some old couple. There was something between them, something that made her feel like an outsider, almost like an intruder.

"No, there's something I'm missing," he said.

"Magic!" Mira teased him, hopping on the bed at his other side.

"Stop it!" he said. "It's something really close, staring me right in the face and I can't see it."

"Like psychic energy aka magic?" Mira said, her face now quite close to his. She just couldn't let go of it.

What was all the talk about psychic energy anyway? Was she now supposed to believe in telepathy and all that?

"Anyway, we'll find it out somehow. Tomorrow. And after that, I'll take you back home," he said, suddenly turning his head to her.

Oh, really?

"Great!" she said and blow out the candle.


Doctor's POV

He was lying on his back, his arms crossed behind his head, staring into darkness. Well, it wasn't that dark in here, but obviously dark enough for humans. Martha on his right side was sleeping, but Mira was still awake, lying on the side with the back to him, facing the window. He was still thinking about what she had wanted to say to him. Certainly not what she actually had said, and he had his own theories why she had asked if Martha could come along. Well, he had to admit that it was nice with Martha, and earlier, much earlier, before the war, he probably would have asked Martha to come along as a companion.

He was only glad that he hadn't got a chance to say what he had been about to say. Had he really been about to talk to her about the kiss? About her whole 'relationship'? That so wasn't him. Maybe it was only because he had had contact with her - with her mind - once to often. Even though it had only been skin deep every time, it certainly had rubbed off on him. All her humanity, that human urge to talk about feelings – even though she wasn't particularly talkative when it came to feelings – their sense for romance, for love – Nah, good that she had started to talk as well right at that moment. Oh well, sure, her words had hurt, but only for a moment, just as he had thought there was something between them, that there was some sort of an understanding, almost as it had been back then in the Observatory. But he had most likely been wrong. He would have been lost for words anyway. What was it he had wanted to tell her? That he - well. He couldn't even think it. So where was the point in speaking, if-

Suddenly Mira turned around, and after a moment she laid her head on his shoulder and one arm over his chest, cuddling up close to his side.

He actually forgot to breathe for a moment, then lifted his head slightly and looked at her. What was that supposed to be? Was she really thinking that he would believe she was sleeping only because her eyes were closed?

She stiffened slightly, and, before she could turn away again and without quite realising what he was doing, he put his arms around her, lightly stroking his fingers over her silky hair and the soft skin of her naked forearms. His nose was filled with the slight smell of lavender and cloves from her soap, which perfectly matched with the unique scent of her body. And she actually did smell good – even though she was human.


Julia N SnowMiko, Ronin Kenshin, bored411, NeoMulder, babypanda-468, 10th Squad 3rd Seat: Thank you all for leaving a review :-)