Chapter 5

He stared at the doors, uncertain of what to do. It startled him when someone or something knocked on the door

"Where are we?" the Doctor asked the TARDIS. "Where have you brought me?"

She didn't respond.

"Why did you bring me here?" he asked her.

She didn't answer. He turned and stared at the screen. It told him he was in New York, 1976, sixty miles from Woodstock, New York.

The thing outside knocked again.

Cautiously he moved toward the door. He reached for the handle, but then pulled back at the last second. What if it was—

The knocking started again and didn't stop. He realized he either had to answer or this was going to go on for a while. The Doctor threw open the door, prepared to fight.

He and the human woman standing outside stared at one another. He didn't notice that she was carrying a large, overfilled duffel bag on one shoulder. He didn't notice that she was not surprised to see him in the slightest. He was too focused on her face because it looked familiar, so very, very familiar, yet he couldn't recall who she was. He couldn't understand why looking at her face made him feel irritated and annoyed. He didn't like this woman, he realized that. He didn't hat her. This was more of a dislike, perhaps a strong one, because she irritated and annoyed him. Why did she do that? It was because the two had a past that he couldn't remember. That was it. But… That past – he could sense it now – that irritation and annoyance had only begun after his recent regeneration. The previous doctor had liked her, a great deal in fact. He had thought highly of her. But the Doctor who he was now did not feel the same. Why? What was it about her that annoyed him so much? What was it about her that grated on his nerves so easily?

"Who are you? Why do I find you so annoying?" he demanded.

"I'm Sara," she answered with an Irish accent, "and probably because you and I haven't gotten on since your last regeneration or whatever it is you did that gave you this," she waved a hand in a circle before his face, "old, cranky, looks like you just ate a lemon, face, is why we annoy each other as we do."

That definitely irritated him. It was no wonder he didn't like this woman. "I don't like your face either."

"So you've said. I'm too plain for you, you've told me."

"You are plain. Ordinary. It's not appealing at all."

"Which is why you always introduce me as 'Sara, tall and ever so plain,' I believe."

"Why are you knocking on my door?"

"Because you had it locked and TARDIS couldn't open it without an actual key, she said."

"TARDIS? This is the TARDIS. You make it sound like TARDIS is a person."

"Oh this just pisses all! We really must have to have this conversation again?" Sara asked him.

"What conversation?"

"Do you not remember that TARDIS is sentient, not just a time machine or a ship. She has feelings, and thoughts, and right now, her thought and feelings are that she needs a friend while she deals with her Doctor being daft and companionless."

There was that irritation again. She was very good at annoying him! "I am not daft! I'm The Doctor. She's my TARDIS. And she doesn't have friends."

Sara laughed, mocking everything he'd just said. "Saying that, you are being daft, and being a bit of an ass, too. Just like the postcard suggested." Sara held up a postcard that showed an actual ass kicking a red telephone booth. Someone had colored the red blue with a pen and put a red light on the top.

He snatched it away from her, looking at both sides several times. The other side had a stamp, a date, and a time written on it. He didn't recognize the handwriting. "Where'd you get this?"

"The mail."

"From whom?"

"That is a right good question. Usually you send them, but since you don't remember sending this one, then clearly we have someone else mixing the pot. Let's play a different game, shall we?"

"Game? I'm not playing a game."

"I am. It's called let me in and we can play all the twenty questions you like inside."

He stared at her. "No." He slammed the door shut and walked toward the center console.

The door opened. He turned and watched Sara walk in. Suddenly a hologram of a black haired, red-leather clad woman appeared between them.

"Sara will be joining us for a while, Doctor."

"TARDIS?" he asked, staring at the hologram.

"Yes," TARDIS answered.

"When did you change to that look? That's not right for you."

"You do not recall what I have ever looked like. Sara will be joining us for a while."

"I don't know her and I do not like her!"

"That doesn't matter. She will be joining us for a while."

"I chose my own companions."

"Yes, you do. And the sooner would definitely be better," TARDIS replied.

"If I should choose my own companions, why is she coming with us?" he asked, walking toward Sara and waving a hand. He stopped with his fingers a few inches from her nose. Sara batted his hand away.

"Because I say she does. You should know that we are no longer being pursued. You may continue on with your journey, Doctor. Sara, I have your room ready if you'd like to get settled in."

"Yep," Sara said, walking around the Doctor and up the stairs. She turned into the first hall.

"I don't need her here," he told TARDIS.

"I know you don't."

"Then why is she here, TARDIS? Why did you let her come in? Tell her to leave."

"I will not. Go where you will, Doctor. Perhaps you could spend some time searching for a companion. Wouldn't that be lovely? But for now, Sara stays." TARDIS turned off the hologram.

He threw up his hands and went to the console.

-#-

The Doctor fled into the TARDIS and slammed the door shut, just as the blast wave hit the outside. The TARDIS rocked a little and then the blast was past. He panted a couple of times before standing up. He walked over to the console, working the controls.

"I needed help this time," he told the TARDIS.

There was no reply.

"If I'm to have a companion it would be useful if that companion actually companioned."

Still no response. He stormed up the stairs and down the hall. He found Sara lounging in a massive library reading a book that had been written by a race that had been extinct a million years before her Neanderthal ancestors walked Earth.

"Good book?" he asked in a cool tone.

"Yes, actually," she answered. "I felt the TARDIS rock. Did you blow up whatever you wanted to blow up?"

"Yes. Thank you for asking."

"Was it as fun as you thought it would be?"

"I never said it was going to be fun. I knew there would be casualties when it happened. I was trying to prevent it. I could have prevented it if my companion had been with me."

"I agree with that. You do realize she's quite mad at you for going it alone, don't you?"

"The TARDIS?"

"Yes."

"She is mad that I did this alone?"

"Yes."

"I'm quite mad about that myself."

Sara looked up at him. "Oh? Then you'll be looking for a companion now?"

"That is you. You are my companion, and as such you are supposed to accompany me when I… do things!" he told her.

Calmly she told him, "I am not your companion. We have been over this, Doctor."

"You are. You have been traveling with me for a while now—"

"Two weeks, in my own timeline, yes, but I am not your companion."

"Then why have you been traveling with me?"

"I have been traveling with the TARDIS, not you."

"The TARDIS is mine therefore—"

"Again, Doctor, the TARDIS is not yours. You are hers. Why are we constantly repeating this conversation?"

"Stop interrupting me! And that's nonsense! The TARDIS belongs to me."

Sara smiled. "No. And the other you understood that. Before you lost your memoires, you understood that. You need to get that fastened in your head, Doctor. She is not yours, you are hers, and I am not your companion."

"Then why are you here? You both have told me it's for her, not me. Explain that. Or are you going to ignore the question completely, again?"

She looked at her book, considering. She looked up at him and nodded once. "You're right. You should know. The answer is, Doctor, Tara, the TARDIS, is stressed out and at her wits end over taking care of you. She asked me to join her for a while because she needed someone to vent to and a shoulder to lean on, as much as a hologram can. That isn't to say you aren't her friend, and she's taken care of you before when there wasn't a companion, but this time you have been particularly difficult to take care of because you lost your memories, and she doesn't know why or how that happened. She's just as scared as you are, Doctor. So she asked me to help her through this period, while she helped you. Do you understand?"

"Yes, but—"

"I wasn't finished. As for the companion… I am not your companion. If that's a term you feel better using, then I am her companion. You, my dear Doctor, find your own companion. One who as adventurous as you, who doesn't take issue risking life and limb, and who is happy living in constant peril. None of which I am. Therefore, you see, Doctor, I would be a terrible companion for you, if that were the case. And it is not." She looked back at her book. "Close the door on your way out, Doctor."

"This conversation isn't over."

An alarm went off. Sara looked up, then at him. "It would appear fate believes otherwise. Have fun adventuring, Doctor. Do be safe."

"How do I get rid of you?" he angrily demanded.

"Stop acting infantile, reckless, and making irrational decisions so that TARDIS doesn't feel like you're running headlong into your own demise. Or find yourself another companion who can keep you from doing that. Believe it or not, the TARDIS is partial of you. She wants you alive, not dead."

The alarm got louder. He stormed out, leaving Sara with her book. The TARDIS hologram appeared in the library.

"Thank you," TARDIS told Sara.

"For what?"

"For saying all of that. He wouldn't have listened to me if I had tried to tell him that."

"Aye, but did he listen to me or just act like he had?"

"We will see." The hologram looked at the door and sighed. "There he goes again. Off to right some wrong he has no business dealing with. He desperately needs his own companion."

"His own? Is that to say I'm yours?"

TARDIS smiled at Sara. "That's to say you are my closest friend, next to him."

Sara smiled at her book. "He'll come around. I know you'd like for him to remember everything, but he can't. There had to have been a reason for why Clara did it, and we have to believe it was for the good of more than just him. Aye?"

TARDIS nodded.

"Don't worry, Tara. He'll find another companion, things will smooth out again, and you'll be back to running across time and space to watch him be the hero he once was. He'll get back to that. I know he will. He's The Doctor."

TARDIS sat down in a nearby chair. "I'm just not so sure this time."

Sara sat up and reached out her hand. The hologram laid her hand in Sara's – as best as a hologram could. Sara smiled.

"I am. It feels like I've been watching you and him many lifetimes, and I believe that you will get him there all in good time. And while you're doing that, I will be here for you for as long as it takes. Friends are funny that way."

TARDIS smiled and nodded. Then her smile faded as her fear that nothing would be the same came back.

-#-

To Be Continued….

Maybe

Probably