So, how it happened? Actually, I was working on my crossover Sherlock/Cinderella (will be published in nearest future), but somehow I got idea for DW. A story of course with a twist, and Master, and former companions, and as we have female Doctor now - who would be a better to play the title role?
Of one thing Doctor was sure, she wasn't climbing a huge Earth looking tree a second ago. She was... Exactly, what was she doing? Where was she? To her astonishment, the time lady couldn't remember. To made matters worse, the branch, on which she was presently sitting on, suddenly broke under her weight and Doctor soon became a mess of tangle painful limbs on the ground.
"Oh, Heaves! Are you all right?" a familiar female voice shouted in worry.
"B...Bill?" Doctor managed to say though her greeted teeth.
"Yes. That's me." her former companion answered, while kneeling next to her. "Please don't try to move. You might have broken something."
"Where are we? ...what do you have on yourself? No wait, what I have on myself?!"
"Huh? It's my usual costume." Bill glanced at her dress, which resembled clothes wore by people from XVI century Europe. Doctor had similar one, but much more dirtier and destroyed. "And we're in our family garden. Don't you remember? Oh, no. Mother! Sister! Please come quickly!"
Even in pain, Doctor managed to look around and basing on a huge quantity of flowers around them, they indeed could be in a garden. There was also a nice looking Georgian house, from which appeared two other familiar ladies in similar clothes as Bill's.
"Adelaide? Donna! How?!"
"What's the matter, my dear?" the oldest woman asked. "Have something happened?"
"It's Cinderella, Mother." Bill explained. "She fell from the tree."
"My goodness! How are you feeling?" Adelaide crouched next to the time lady as well.
"Better ask - have you gone mad!?" Donna was clearly furious, but Doctor know her long enough to recognize glints of worry in her firm tone. "Can't you see how tall it is!? You could have broken your neck!"
"S...Sorry." Doctor apologized and decided that if everyone around her was behaving quite extraordinary and her companions appeared from nowhere, she would play along, or more precisely - pretend to have a memory loss. "But I'm not quite sure, where I am."
"...Donna, dear." Adelaide told her 'daughter'. "Please ask doctor to come here at once."
"But I'm the Doctor." the time lady might not know, where she was, but of that she was certain.
"Yep. Right away, Mother." Donna exchanged a worried glance with two ladies and quickly ran off.
"Umm... why have you called me 'Cinderella'?"
ooo
In the conclusion, Doctor Ronald Pond stated that except of few bruises and problems with memory, the time lady was completely fine. However, he advised to have her rest for another five days.
"So, my name is Cinderella." Doctor said from beneath her covers (She had to admit that she was given a lovely bedroom.) "My mother died, when I was little, then my father married you."
"Very well, my dear." Adelaide praised her from her chair.
"It's ridiculous." Donna commented, who was standing nearby with her 'sister'. "Why does she have to repeat everything?"
"Doctor Pond told us that it's the best way to have Cinderella remember everything." Bill reminded.
"And my father?" the time lady asked. "I don't know anything about him. Is he here?"
"I'm sorry to tell you, but he left city in business two weeks ago and will be returning at fastest in next month." her Stepmother answered. "He loves you very much and would be worried just as we are, if he was with us."
"He is alive. Strange. Are you sure?"
"Umm... yes, I am."
"Oh, OK." Doctor mused, as the father from fairy tale was dead, in most versions anyway. "Then, Bill and Donna are my two stepsisters."
"Who aren't ugly or rude." she added in her thoughts.
"That's us." Donna waved her hand.
"We aren't very rich," Doctor continued. "thus we can't afford servants to take care of the house. So, I'm the only person responsible for cleaning, cooking ... "
"Not exactly." Bill stopped her.
"Huh?"
"We are indeed in... a difficult position, but it's me, Mother and Donna, who do all houseworks."
"What? Why?"
"Dear, you aren't a servant." Adelaide patted her arm. "Even more, you are the lady of the house. Why would you think otherwise?"
"Because I'm Cinderella?"
Another exchange of worried glances between sisters and their mother.
"Girls, please can you leave me and Cinderella alone for moment?"
"Have I said something wrong?" Doctor asked, when there was only her and Adelaide in the bedroom.
"No, dear. I believe that it was me, who might have behaved improperly in the end." the older woman stated. "But let me start from the beginning. Death of any mother is very hard, especially for a small child. You weren't an exception. It had to be even sadder, when the other parent was often absent due to his work. Having a stranger marrying your father wasn't easy as well. Moreover, a person, who had two daughters of her own..."
"And?" Doctor encourage her to continue.
"At first you lost mother, who adored you completely, then your father had to share his attention with new three people, you had a difficult time adjusting... however we all hoped that in the end all will be fine. My lovely Graham always says... are you all right? Your face looks pale."
"Yep. Completely fine." Doctor reassured her.
"As soon as I will come to peace with the thought that Graham is my father." she told to herself.
"You were left utterly alone." the stepmother continued. "What's worse, we also lost a part of our family fortune and we had to move to a new place. As you can see, our current home isn't luxurious, however enough for our five and much easier to manage than a huge villa. If only Graham could spend more time with us. Unfortunately, even when we reduce our expenses, he still has to travel. Being a seller is very hard."
"When did my mother die?"
"You were six then. I married your father three years later."
"Oh, I see. And cleaning?"
"Umm... we wouldn't dare to ask you about such things. Especially, as you are a very stubborn girl."
"That means..."
Adelaide was rather ashamed to say it and tried to avoid the topic. However Doctor insisted. In the end, she was informed that Cinderella behaved more like a naught child, than a poor goodhearted girl from the fairy tale. She didn't respect anyone, even her own father. Furthermore, Cinderella often lied that she is being mistreated by her family. Neighbours frequently complained about her rude behaviour and accused her of stealing their things. The girl didn't want to eat meals, didn't want to take her baths or sleep when needed. (Now, Doctor knew what smelled so horribly). Climbing a tall tree was another sign of her displeasure with the current life.
Because of all those and as Cinderella was always walking in dirty clothes and dishevelled hair, most of people avoided her and even her family. If Graham, Adelaide, Donna or Bill ever approached her with any insignificant request, they all were met with illogical outburst from her side.
"A few days ago, the roof broke right above your room. I had to move you to Donna's and Bill's quarter, but you weren't fond of this idea." Adelaide lowered her head. "In my anger, I told you that you may sleep in the kitchen instead. And you did. On the next morning, you started coughing so strongly. I asked you to take a syrup, but you refused and hid on the tree. I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have given you my room, I'm sure that I would have managed squeezing with girls in theirs and you wouldn't have had this awful accident."
"No, please. Don't cry. It was my fault and you showed a lot of patience and caring for me. I will be fine in few days and I'm not coughing now."
Adelaide smiled a little and intended to say something, but then Cinderella's stepsisters suddenly entered the room.
"Mother! You will not guess what we've just received!" Bill shouted as she gave her a letter. "It's an invitation for the ball in the castle!"
"And the Prince is looking for a wife! AAA!" Donna added, making all occupants to cover their ears. "Wait for me my charming, you will faint, when you see me!"
"That's wonderful" the stepmother exclaimed. "It's in a week time. We will have enough time to prepare and our Cinderella should be back to her healthy self again."
"May I come, too?" Doctor asked surprised. It also wasn't in the original story.
"Of course, you may, my dear. We wouldn't want it otherwise."
"Bill, let's see what we can find among our clothes." Donna told her sister. "I already have an few ideas. All will be marvellous!"
ooo
Doctor was more than grateful to leave all preparation for her stepsisters, as she could focus only on exploring her surrounding, which unfortunately looked very normal. No daleks. No cyberman. No mysterious entities. (Doctor missed her screwdriver.) What's the most annoying, she still couldn't remind herself where she was before appearing in Cinderella's house. Surely, Doctor and her Fam were in Tardis and if memory served her right (probably not), Yaz proposed that they could go... exactly, where?
Then, came the day of the ball and fake Cinderella rebuked herself for forgetting that she was in a fairytale kingdom.
"A dress?" Doctor eyed her new clothes.
"Yep, do you like it?" Donna asked. "I've spent ages on making it."
"It's pink..."
"Yes, a beautiful colour for every lady."
"Umm..."
"Oh, stars. I remember now." Donna shook her head. "I didn't ask you which colour you prefered. I'm so sorry. Maybe I could find something else."
"In one hour?"
"Fine, we need a miracle."
Yes, it wasn't possible, so Doctor agreed to take what was given. Particularly, as Donna was very proud of her work. However a new problem arise, when her shoes mysteriously vanished. Each of ladies offered her own, but they were too big or too small. In the end, Doctor had to take her garden heavy boots. Truth to be told, the time lady was relieved - slippers were so uncomfortable. Moreover, it was a Cinderella story, losing shoes was a part of it, wasn't it? Or did her fairy Godmother steal them? Where was she anyway?
ooo
Master had no idea how it happened, but somehow he woke up as the prince of a fairytale kingdom. It wasn't so bad, the time lord had a huge castle, servants and private army. (Well, he would have it, when the father-king would pass away.) However even with all mentioned benefits, Master wanted to get out. For days, he had been searching for any kind of clue, which would tell him what was going on, but all was fruitless.
"Stuck in a fairy tale, you say?" his 'father' asked, when they both were dining in a huge royal lounge. "It's quite an unique description of your current predicament, my son."
Master only snorted in response above his meal.
"In that case, you may either go with the story or against it." the king advised. "Well, whatever you will choose, at least you can be certain of your valuable role."
"What?"
"Son, you may think of being someone else, but you're still the Prince. If I recall correctly, they often have to kill some monsters or..."
"Rescue a lady." Master finished.
"However, none of these seems to suit. We have peace and no one is being mistreated in our kingdom."
Actually, Master already chose to NOT follow the story, however as it hadn't brought any results and it was difficult to find out in which fairy tale he was, it seemed that the time lord would need to go in other direction. To his dread, he realised that it was leaving only one option.
"I need a wife."
ooo
So here he was - on the ball, among many posh looking women, one worst than the other. Disgusting. There passed two hours and Master was slowly loosing hope of finding anything/anyone useful, but then...
The king didn't approve of his solution. He was very upset that he wanted to marry a lady on the whim, however after long negotiations the king calmed down and only advised Master to at least choose the most beautiful woman, which he would see.
She had just entered the ball room.