Author's Note:
Blimey, and I was worried about this chapter being too short. Just goes to show, you never know :P
Anyway, thanks so much to those brilliant folks who were kind enough to provide feedback for the previous chapters - yes, I mean you: SophieQueenOfTheWorld, Guest,EmmaMarie, EDZEL2, Aietradaea, MountainLord-92, irishartemis, The Yoshinator, MayFairy, TheWickedHeart, BlackMoonWhiteSky and Theta'sWorstNightmare.
As I've said to a few people, I'm very much enjoying writing Ten for a change. However, for those following "Falling Out Of The World", don't fret, I am writing the next chapter - I promise I won't leave the Time Lords staring up at a lethal falling chandelier for much longer.
Allons-y!
- Chapter Three -
The Doctor jumped to his feet, brushed the snow off the front of his coat, and then extended a hand to Allie in a gentlemanly fashion. She took it and allowed him to help her to her feet. Behind them, the pond was virtually empty, nothing but a muddy, slimy hole in the ground, the majority of the water having cascaded all around the park with the force of the explosion. There was going to be hell to pay when the Council got a load of that, Allie thought ruefully. Not to mention the local police, if anyone had called them. Fortunately, the park had been deserted, the extreme cold having discouraged even the most determined of early morning joggers. Even so, this was London – someone would have heard such a deafening explosion. And, ten to one, they would have rung the police. After all, that's what she would have done, if she wasn't the one stuck in the middle of it all. She tried to visualise the faces of the attending officers as the Doctor did his best to explain what had happened, rattling on about...what was it? Rutans? Sontarans? Her mind baulked at the disturbing prospect. Altogether, it was probably best for neither of them to be there when the police arrived.
She tucked her arm companionably into the Doctor's, walking quickly towards the entrance to the park and pulling him along with her. There didn't seem to be any extra activity on the street, much to her relief. The only unusual thing was a blue police box, situated on the footpath opposite the shop, which she was sure hadn't been there yesterday. Hoping that no-one was inside the box watching them, she put her head down and hurried towards the shop.
"So...how do you like your tea?" she asked brightly. "White? Black? Sugar?"
The Doctor put up no resistance, allowing himself to be shepherded along, his brown eyes brimming with suppressed laughter as he looked down at her. Allie had the strong impression that he knew exactly what she was up to, and it amused him very much.
"And there it is again!" he said jubilantly.
Alarmed, she looked all around, half expecting to see another enormous blowfly bearing down on them. "What?"
"That calm, practical streak," the Doctor answered. "I've just blown up your local park with an alien bomb that was ticking away in your shop, but do you faint or burst into tears or start yelling at me? No, you instantly start thinking about how we can both make a clean getaway. Unflappable, that's you, Allie Castiel, totally unflappable. It's very impressive."
Allie felt her cheeks growing warm at the compliment. She'd never particularly thought of herself as impressive in any way before, but it was nice that he thought so. "I'm probably still in shock, to tell you the truth," she replied, as they crossed the road back towards the shop. "I'm pretty sure I've never had anyone rescue me from certain death before and definitely not twice in as many days. I think the nearest I've ever come was when a bloke dived across the bar in a pub to stop a pint of lager spilling all over me. And even then, I think he was more worried about saving the lager than about me, so it wasn't quite the same."
The Doctor's lips twitched humorously. "No, I don't suppose it was. You're very welcome for both rescues." He paused for a moment and pointed up at the sign above the shop door. It read: 'Ye Old Curiosity Shoppe, Antiques and Bric-a-brac'. "I like the name of your shop. Very appropriate, when you think about it."
Allie glanced up at the bold, black calligraphy. "My aunt was a Dickens fan."
"Good for her!" the Doctor approved. "He was brilliant, old Chas. A bit of a know-it-all, mind you, but nobody's perfect. As for your shop, I think I'd better make sure there aren't any more 'curiosities' lurking about in there!"
"Please do!" Allie agreed fervently, pushing open the door and going inside, shivering as the comforting warmth of the small room enveloped her frozen body. "I could do without any more nasty surprises this week. What I don't understand, though, Doctor, is where these...things...came from in the first place. You seem to think they belonged to two different alien species. How did they end up sold at auction in Africa, mixed in with a miscellaneous job lot of ugly old tat?"
The Doctor followed her in and closed the door. "Truth?" he responded. "I'm not exactly sure. But when I scanned that Xbekian bronze cylinder, I found residual Rift energy clinging to it. Judging from that, I suspect that a teeny tiny temporal rift may have opened up somewhere in Africa, and someone's been very busy collecting the artefacts coming through it."
Allie sighed at the incomprehensibility of it all. "Okay, you've lost me again. What's a temporal rift, teeny tiny or otherwise?"
"It's a weakness in time and space. People and objects can pass through it, moving from one location in spacetime to another. Basically, it's like a huge garbage disposal unit – it sucks in the flotsam and jetsam of the Universe at one point and spits it out at another," he explained. "The major opening to it on Earth is situated in Cardiff. A little while back, it fractured, and the Rift temporarily expanded to cover other places as well, including London and Tokyo. The most extensive fissures repaired themselves when the Rift closed again, but there were a few little nicks in Time that never quite healed. For instance, there's one in Mexico that tends to be very annoyingly active. And now, quite possibly, one in Africa somewhere."
"Okay, so there are holes in the space/time continuum and dangerous stuff is falling through them for anyone and his brother to pick up," Allie said slowly. "I've read enough science fiction to get the concept. But shouldn't we do something about it? Stop it happening before someone gets badly hurt? Some poor civilian like me who has absolutely no idea what's going on?"
The Doctor hunched his shoulders. "It's not that easy, unfortunately. But I've got my very best man on the job, promise. His name is Captain Jack Harkness and he's very experienced with temporal rifts. In fact, he's very experienced with a lot of other things as well, but some stuff you just don't want to know, unless you've got access to some industrial strength mind bleach. Anyway, the point is, I gave him a call yesterday. He and his team will locate the fissure in Africa and monitor any future activity, which hopefully should stop anyone else getting hurt."
Before Allie could formulate a reply to this, they heard the wailing sound of sirens fast approaching. "Ah, the boys in blue. Always so subtle, aren't they, the London constabulary?" the Doctor noted sarcastically, peeking out the front window at the police cars screaming to a halt across the road in front of the park.
"I wouldn't know," she replied, coming to stand by his side and watching the uniformed officers hare off into the park. "I've never had much to do with them until now."
"They won't find anything. There's nothing left to find. Rutan photonic bombs are fairly efficient that way."
The stark implications of that comment made her shudder as she imagined all too clearly what would have happened if the bomb had gone off in the shop. Or, even worse, in his hand.
He slanted a look down at her. "You're shivering. Those clothes are soaking wet. Have you got any others to put on? Don't want you coming down with something serious."
"No, we wouldn't want that." Her lips quirked in an odd half smile. "I've got some other things in the back. What about you?"
"Me? Nah, I had my handy-dandy coat on. Right as a trivet, me." With that, he stripped off his damp coat and looked around for somewhere to hang it, before settling for a convenient deer-head mounted rather crookedly on the wall. "Although, why a trivet should be more right than anything else is really anyone's guess. Like saying right as rain. Why is rain supposed to be always right, I'd like to know? I've had days when the rain has been very wrong indeed."
"Do you always talk this much?" Allie asked in amusement. He reminded her of Tigger out of the Winnie-the-Pooh books she had read as a kid, always bouncing about everywhere, full of energy, enthusiasm and constant chatter. And yet, as the same time, she got the feeling that she was merely seeing the tiniest tip of the iceberg. Beneath the cheerful banter, there was whole a lot more to the Doctor than outward appearances would suggest.
"Not at all!" he returned. "Mostly, I talk a lot more. I just didn't want to hold you up while you're so cold and wet. Off you go. I'll hold the fort here."
With that, he pulled his silver wand-thing out of his coat pocket and began waving it over the nearest shelf of artefacts. Allie hesitated for a second, debating the wisdom of leaving her shop in charge of a complete stranger. But every instinct she possessed was telling her that she could trust the Doctor, not just with the shop, but with everything else as well. So she turned away and headed for the back room, patting Charlie absent-mindedly on the head as she went.
She had hardly gone three steps before the bells over the door tinkled again. Thinking it was the police, Allie composed her features into what she hoped was an innocent expression and swung around. A dumpy little old lady, with carefully-hennaed hair and a face like a wrinkly apple, was entering the shop, brushing snow off her black woollen jacket on to the previously clean floor. Allie nearly groaned aloud. It was Mrs Neeson, one of her regular customers – if you could call someone a customer when they never bought anything. She was always coming into the shop and wasting oodles of Allie's time showing her everything, only to say that none of it suited her and walking out empty-handed, leaving Allie fuming behind her.
"Hello, dear. Did you know there were police everywhere outside?" the old woman chirped. "It's all very exciting. Apparently there was some sort of explosion in the park. Bound to be kids mucking around though, isn't it? Little devils. They get away with a lot more than they did in my day, I can tell you."
Allie forced a smile to her face. "Hello, Mrs Neeson. What can we do for you today?"
Mrs Neeson hobbled forward into the shop. "It's our Agnes's birthday next week and I was hoping to get her something special. I'm not sure I've come to the right place, though. You never seem to have anything different, do you, dear?"
Allie ground her teeth at the woman's saccharine-sweet voice. After everything that had happened, she really wasn't in the mood for this today. Nothing different! Ha, if only she knew...! In fact, if Allie had had been able to lay her hands on another Rutan whatsy-thingy bomb, she would gladly have given it to the stingy old besom, free of charge, just to be rid of her.
She was about to unleash a stinging retort, when the Doctor intervened, flashing the old woman his mega-watt smile. "Perhaps I could be of some assistance, Mrs Leeson?"
"It's Neeson, luv, Mrs Neeson," she replied, eyeing him up and down with interest nonetheless. "And who might you be? I don't remember seeing you in here before?"
"Mrs Neeson, yes, of course you are!" the Doctor said smoothly. "I'm John Smith, Miss Castiel's new assistant. Miss Castiel has some things to do in back, but I'd be delighted to help you pick out a present for your Agnes."
Mrs Neeson shot Allie a sly glance, the sharp black eyes in her pale face reminding Allie of two currants pressed into a ball of dough. "Oooh, a handsome young man as an assistant, you are doing well for yourself, dear. And he's dressed in a nice suit – you don't see that often these days."
The Doctor transferred his bright, confident grin to Allie. "Go on, then. We're all good here."
Allie's wet clothes were really starting to be uncomfortable by now and she could feel a big sneeze coming on, so she decided not to argue. If he really wanted Mrs Neeson that badly, he could have her. Perhaps after this he would be a little more careful what he volunteered for. Dealing with giant blowflies was a lot more appealing than suffering through a conversation with that old witch.
"White with three," he added, as she slipped behind the counter.
Allie frowned, but then smoothed her forehead out, aware of Mrs Neeson's inquisitive gaze resting on her. "Sorry?"
"You asked how I liked my tea? That's it – milk with three sugars."
"Three sugars?" Just the thought of all that concentrated sweetness made her want to gag. "Are you sure?"
"Yep. A looooong time ago, I used to drink it with four. Not so long ago, I preferred two. Now though, I'm definitely a three sugar man!"
"Okay, you asked for it." With that, she went through into the back room, leaving the door slightly ajar, so she could keep an eye on what was happening.
The Doctor had already returned his attention to Mrs Neeson and was burbling happily away. Allie switched the kettle on to boil and then grabbed her spare clothes out of a cupboard in the storeroom. All she had was a pair of faded jeans, an ancient T-shirt and an old red cable-knit jumper she liked to wear when lounging around on the weekend. It wasn't usually what she'd wear to work, but beggars couldn't be choosers. Nipping into the toilet, she took her time getting changed, her chilled skin welcoming the soft, warm comfort of the well-worn clothes. Then she returned to the kitchenette to make the Doctor his tea.
She could still hear him chatting away nineteen to the dozen. Mrs Neeson didn't seem to be getting a word in edgeways, something which made Allie grin maliciously. She lifted down two mugs and popped a tea bag in each. Hers had red hearts dotted all over it, while the Doctor's was larger, with a quote printed on it in blue writing that said, "THE ANGELS HAVE THE PHONEBOX". She'd bought it on a whim one day, from a bloke's stall at the Portobello Markets. He'd also been selling T-Shirts with the same logo. She didn't know what it was supposed to mean, really, but she thought it sounded interesting.
Just as she was scooping three generous helpings of sugar into the Doctor's mug, she heard the ring of the antique cash register. Her eyes widened. "No way!" she gasped.
Abandoning the mugs on the bench, she hurried back out into the front room, just in time to see the Doctor jovially ushering Mrs Neeson out of the shop.
"Well, you just think about it, Mrs Neeson, that's all I'm saying," he continued, holding the door open for her. "Remember, the early bird catches the worm and all that."
"I certainly will, Mr Smith," the woman said in a besotted voice. "I certainly will. Until next time, then!"
The door shut and the Doctor spun around to face Allie, a triumphant expression on his face. "Oh, I am good. Congratulations, Allie Castiel, you are now £210 richer!"
"You actually sold her something?" Allie asked dazedly, as he came towards her.
"Three somethings, actually. A particularly ugly little vase, a set of silver spoons...Georgian, if I'm not mistaken...and one of those fertility god statues with the really big whatsit. And I'm pleased to report, there wasn't a trace of rogue Rift energy on any of them, because I checked."
Allie was still too stunned to be in the least bit worried about rogue Rift energy. "You sold Mrs Neeson a fertility god statue with a big whatsit?"
"Yup. I bet her Agnes will love it!" he grinned naughtily. "Oh, and I had a go at getting her to buy your terracotta warrior there too. Not quite so much luck with that, I'm afraid, although she did say she'd think about it."
"Charlie?" Allie sputtered, bursting into incredulous laughter at the thought. "Oh my God, you tried to sell Charlie? You might be good, Doctor, but you bit off a bit more than you can chew there. No-one can sell Charlie. It's not humanly possible!"
The humour faded from his gaze, his brown eyes becoming oddly grave as they held hers. "You're assuming I'm human," he said quietly.
Allie's mouth went dry with shock. Logically, she knew she should laugh, make a joke of it, treat it like more of his nonsensical banter. But something in his steady gaze told her that he was completely serious. She'd known from the first second he'd walked into her shop that he was different to any other man that she'd ever met – that he was somehow...extraordinary. But she'd never suspected anything like this. "Not...human?" she whispered.
He came nearer, until he was standing directly in front of her. "Give me your hand, Allie."
Hesitantly, she did as he asked. After all, she thought, if he'd been going to harm her, he'd had plenty of other opportunities. She felt his long, cool fingers wrapping around her small, shaky ones. Then he brought her hand up to the right side of his chest, sliding it under the lapel of his suit jacket. She could feel his heart pounding out a regular rhythm under her hand.
"Feel it?" he asked.
Staring fixedly at his tie, she nodded silently, unable to trust her voice. Then he moved her hand across to the left side of his chest, again tucking it inside the warmth of his jacket. Allie stiffened, her whole body going taut with tension. To her utter astonishment, she felt another heartbeat pulsing under her touch.
Her eyes flew to meet his once more. "Two hearts," she croaked, her mind whirling backwards to the previous day, when she had thought she heard an extra heartbeat in his chest, but had dismissed the idea as ridiculous. "You have two hearts."
"I'm a Time Lord," he said, still holding her hand against his second heart. "The last Time Lord, actually. The rest of my people are gone now. I come from a planet a long, long way from Earth. So no, I'm not human."
"What...what happened to the rest of your people?" she ventured.
His face hardened and she could see no trace of the merry, laughing man who had been there just a few moments ago. This man had been through terrible pain and hardship and loss, his brown eyes haunted by grief. His expression was so like the one he had worn in her nightmare that Allie felt her breath catch.
"There was a war," he said curtly. "They died."
Compassion welled inside her and tears prickled her eyes. What did you say to someone who had lost an entire planet? She tried to imagine what it would be like to be the only survivor of all the people on Earth, but she couldn't even begin to wrap her mind around it. "I'm sorry, Doctor."
He gave her a tight, mirthless smile and released her hand. "Yeah, well, like I said yesterday...it's never easy to lose people." Then, as if determined to change the subject, he clapped his hands and rubbed them together. "Right...where's this cuppa? After my amazing display of salesmanship, I think I think I've earned it!"
There were a million questions Allie wanted to ask – no, more like a hundred million, churning wildly through her head. But it was obvious he didn't want to discuss it any further, so with some difficulty she bit her tongue and let it go. "They're in back. Three sugars, just like I promised. Although how you can drink it like that, I'll never know."
He followed her back through the door and she handed him his tea. His eyebrows shot up instantly. "Where did you get this mug?"
"I bought it off a bloke named Larry at the Portobello Market," she said, a wave of alarm surging through her. "They were selling like hotcakes. Why? It's not one of these Rift artefacts, is it?"
"No, not at all. Good old Larry Nightingale!" the Doctor chortled, holding the mug up in front of his eyes. "Turns out he's a bit of an entrepreneur on the side! Who'd have thought!"
"You know him?"
"You'd be surprised at the people I know, Allie Castiel!" He took a huge swig of his tea. "Mmmmm... now that's good tea! Put hairs on your chest, that would!"
"I hope not, since I'm drinking it too," she smiled, taking a sip from her own mug.
He leaned back on the bench, his long, lanky legs casually crossed at the ankles. "So, I've told you my deep, dark secrets. What about you then? What's your story?"
Allie doubted she'd even scratched the surface of his deep, dark secrets, but it didn't seem very polite to say so. She wrinkled her forehead, trying to decide how much to tell him.
"No real mystery here. It's all very boring. I'm twenty six years old. I live in a little flat about five minutes walk from here. My parents split up when I was a little kid. Dad remarried and lives on a farm in Shropshire. I don't see him very often, he's pretty busy with his new family. Mum travels all over, she pops in every now and then to say hi, mostly with a new boyfriend. I don't bother to remember their names any more, because she brings a different one every time she comes. My Aunt Vanessa brought me up, more or less. As soon as I finished my A-levels, I came to work with her here in the shop. Then, like I said, she died last week and left it to me, debts and all. That's about it, really."
It wasn't it, of course. There was a lot more she could have said, if she had wanted to. But she felt no guilt in keeping it to herself. If the Doctor could keep his secrets, she could keep hers.
"I had another friend with an Aunt Vanessa once," the Doctor said with a gloomy air. "It didn't end well for her either."
Allie raised her eyebrows at the conversational curveball. Whatever comment she had expected him to make, that hadn't been it. However, from what she could tell, the Doctor wasn't generally in the habit of doing what other people expected him to. It wasn't necessarily a bad thing – but it did take some getting used to. She wondered what had happened to his other friend's Aunt Vanessa, but wasn't sure she wanted to ask.
Catching her expression, he pulled a rueful face. "Oops, that was probably rude and insensitive, wasn't it? People are always telling me I'm rude and insensitive."
She laughed. "It's okay, I forgive you. Your turn in the confessional now. You said your planet was gone. Does that mean you live on Earth now?"
"Live here?" he snorted. "No chance! Most humans are very nice and all that, but living on a planet full of them... I don't think so. No, I travel around the Universe in my ship, the TARDIS, doing a bit of this and a bit of that. Seeing everything there is to see, that kind of thing."
"You have a ship?"
"Yeah. Looks like a blue police box. I've parked her outside."
Allie remembered the tall blue box she had seen earlier out on the footpath and the penny dropped. "That was your ship?" she gasped.
He nodded proudly. "Best ship in the Universe. We've been together a very long time."
"But...if you're travelling all over the Universe...doesn't it get a bit...cramped, in there?"
His face lit up with child-like glee, as if she had just asked the one question he loved to answer more than any other. "It's bigger on the inside."
Allie studied him carefully, trying to decide whether or not he was pulling her leg. "Bigger...on the inside...?"
"Ye-p!" He hesitated for a long moment, as if he was mentally wrestling with himself about something. Then he set down his mug decisively and said, "Why don't you come and see for yourself? I've been planning a short hop to Mars for quite a while. How about you come with me?"
"Me...come with you...to Mars," she echoed unsteadily.
"Why not? Very interesting place, Mars. Very dusty. Very...red. We can drop in, have a quick look around, then pop back here again for another cup of tea, if you want. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy."
Allie wanted to pinch herself. A couple of days ago, she had been an ordinary person living what probably would qualify as the most ordinary – no, not just ordinary, the most boring – life in history. Now she had a bi-cardial alien with great hair and gorgeous brown eyes asking her to take a trip with him in his spaceship to see the planet Mars. There had to be a thousand reasons why this was an extremely bad idea. But right now, she couldn't think of a single one.
However, before she could answer, the bells on the exterior door jangled again, shattering the mood between them. A pair of heavy boots stomped across the wooden floor. Allie sighed crossly. If this was the police, they had really poor timing. But it wasn't the police. It was much worse than that. Before either of them could react, the door into the shop burst open, and a stocky, well-muscled young man with short, blonde hair staggered inside. Allie's heart plummeted into her boots with dismay. It was none other than Two-Timing Terrence, the cheating, lowlife loser she had dumped nearly a year ago. Even worse, from the way he lurched into the room, it appeared he had been drinking. Allie felt her hands involuntarily curling into tight fists. What the hell was he doing here?
He looked around the room blearily until he located her standing with the Doctor in the kitchenette.
"Allie!" he exclaimed, in the lilting Irish accent she had once found so charming. Now, however, he was about the last person in the world she ever wanted to see again. He stumbled towards her, ignoring the Doctor completely. "There you are, my gorgeous girl!"
"What do you want, Terry?" she snapped icily.
"Aw, please don't be like that, sweetheart!" he entreated. "Not when I've come to tell you I'm sorry. I made a terrible mistake. I've come to beg you to take me back."
"You're drunk!" she retorted in disgust.
"Not so drunk that I don't know what I threw away! I need you, Allie!"
To Allie's utter mortification, her inebriated ex threw himself to his knees in front of her and grabbed for her hand. His fingers felt hot and sweaty and extremely unpleasant, a total contrast to the Doctor's cool, firm grip.
"Allie Castiel," he proclaimed loudly, punctuating his declaration with a loud and resonant belch. "I'm asking you...no, I'm begging you...will you make me the happiest man in the world by becoming my wife?"
Allie could quite happily have died on the spot. This would have been embarrassing enough if it had happened while she was here on her own. But for it to happen in front of the Doctor... Scarlet with humiliation, she tried to pull her hand away, but Terrence clung on as tightly as a limpet, staring up at her imploringly.
"Um..." the Doctor said, his face suddenly blank. To Allie's horror, she realised he was edging towards the door. "Yeah, probably a bad idea, after all. Thanks for the tea. I can see you've already got your hands full here, so I'd better be on my way."
"No, wait..." she cried, trying to disentangle herself from Terrence the Two-Timing Octopus.
Standing at the door, the Doctor looked back and gave her a wistful smile. "Goodbye, Allie Castiel. It was nice meeting you."
Then, just like that, he was gone. Frantically, Allie redoubled her efforts to get free, but Terrence only held on even tighter.
"Who was that?" he demanded jealously. "Was that your new bloke?"
The bells on the exterior door jangled as the Doctor left and Allie's temper finally boiled over. "Oooooh, you... you IDIOT!" she yelled furiously.
Pulling back her small fist, she punched Terrence with all her strength, letting him have exactly what he deserved, square on the nose. Squealing like a girl, he abruptly released her, his hands automatically flying up to staunch the blood that was pouring from his nostrils. Cradling her aching fist, Allie didn't stop to see how much damage she had done. She was already running through the shop, calling the Doctor's name. His coat was gone from the deer head on the wall, and through the blur of the plate glass in the front window, she could indistinctly make out a tall, tan-coloured blur crossing the road. She sprinted across to the outer door and tore it open.
"DOCTOR! WAIT!"
But all that was left was the swirl of his coat tails as he vanished inside the tall, blue police box on the corner. Almost instantly, there was a strange wheezing, groaning noise and the police box began to fade in and out, until it became nothing more than a faint blue smudge which disappeared into thin air, taking the Doctor with it. To go to Mars, to travel the Universe. Without her.
Allie wrapped her arms around herself in comfort, frustrated tears of disappointment trickling down her face. All she could think about was that, this time, the Doctor had said goodbye. And there had been no mention of him ever seeing her again.
"You all right, dear?" asked a sugar-sweet voice. Looking around, buried in misery, she saw the highly unwelcome sight of Mrs Neeson tripping down the street towards her. "I just wanted to tell you that I've decided to buy that terracotta warrior after all. He should look splendid in my entrance hall. Like your young man said, one should never pass up the opportunity of a lifetime."
"He's not my young man," Allie responded dully, glancing back to the place where the TARDIS had so recently disappeared. "And I think that's exactly what I just did."
Another Author's Note:
Just a bit of trivia for you, the Third Doctor drank tea with four sugars, the Ninth Doctor drank it with two. So I've decided that Ten would split the difference and drink it with three.
Also, in case you are not a fan of ClassicWho, the former friend with the aunt called Vanessa was Tegan, from the Fifth Doctor's era. Her Aunt Vanessa was killed by the Master, who used the Tissue Compression Eliminator on her.
Ciao for now!