You know you wanted some kitty!Twelve today! I'd like to thank unwillingadventurer for explaining British school to me.
"Clara!" came a familiar shout from the other side of the classroom door. The shout was accompanied by what sounded like frantic scratching.
She sighed. Addicted as she was to the thrill of time travel, she still had a job to worry about. "Doctor, it's Wednesday. I'm about to start a lesson!" Clara yanked open the door. "Whatever it is, it can wait until after school."
All she saw was empty hallway. But she could've sworn-
"No, it can't!" came a voice from the floor. Clara looked down just in time to see a grey streak dart through her legs, across the room, and under her desk.
"Doctor?"
There was a long, furry tail hanging out of the bottom desk drawer she'd been rummaging through. She crouched down and pulled it all the way open. "Why are you a cat?" Good lord, somehow he still managed to have prominent eyebrows.
"Don't let them in!"
"Wh-?"
Behind her, four year 7 girls entered the room, giggling loudly. "Miss, have you seen a cat run through here?" asked one.
"Ooo, there he is!" squealed another.
"Go away!" shouted the Doctor, darting out of the drawer and making a break for the window in the back of the classroom. Still giggling and cooing, the girls chased after him. The Doctor leapt up only to find that the window was shut, and then the schoolgirls were upon him. "No, no, no! No hugging, I don't do hugging! Clara!" They'd completely ignored his protests and scooped him up. He flailed
Clara rushed to his rescue. "Girls, I don't think the cat wants to-OW!" As soon as she'd gotten close enough, he'd jumped out of their arms and climbed up hers to her shoulder, where he managed to position himself behind her head to use her as a shield. Clara reached up to remove his claws from her scalp, wrestling him from his position.
"Aw, is that your kitty, miss?" asked one of the girls, reaching out to pet him.
"Clara, get rid of them! You're their teacher, give them detention or something!"
Strangely enough, this only made the girls laugh more. "Oh, he's a chatty one, isn't he?"
"Yes..." said Clara. "Oh, look! It's almost time for class, you'd better get going." She hastily ushered the girls to the door, the Doctor protesting loudly at their continued attempts to pet him. "And let's keep this whole cat thing to ourselves, yeah?"
Once they were gone, she dropped him onto her desk and gave him her best stern teacher face. The Doctor didn't notice, instead muttering something about the inverse ratio of human brain function in proximity to small, furry things. "Why are you here?!" demanded Clara. "I mean, why are you a cat? No, actually, I mean how the hell am I going to explain a talking cat in my classroom?"
"What talking cat?" asked the Doctor, brows furrowed.
"You!"
"Me?"
"You're the only cat in here!"
"Ah," he said. "I'm not actually talking. Not in the way you understand." When she continued to stare at him, he continued. "Come on, Clara! I've got feline vocal chords, a muzzle, no lips...I physically cannot make the sounds required for English! What you're hearing is the TARDIS translating for me."
"So...you're a cat, and I'm the only one who can hear you?"
"Yes."
Seeing such an intense Doctor-ish look on a cat's face would have been hilarious in other circumstances. As it were, it was almost time for the bell signalling the start of the day's classes, and this was really not the best time for shenanigans. Clara pulled out her chair. "Alright, hop down."
"What?"
"In five minutes, my year 10s are going to start coming in that door and if they see a cat sitting on my desk, they will want to cuddle it. Now you can sit up here and deal with it, or you can hide for a bit until we figure out what to do with you."
For once he didn't argue with her. Now if he would just stay there until her lunch break...
"...and for those of you who actually bothered to read the fourth act, you may have noticed Prospero warns Ferdinand not to break Miranda's "virgin-knot" before the wedding. And yes, that means exactly what you think it does. The bluntness of the discussion highlights how innocent Miranda is, having been so isolated her whole life."
She paused in her lecture to write down a key bullet point on the board. Behind her, she could hear a few gasps, followed by silent sniggering. It was to be expected, she'd just alluded to sex in a roomful of teenagers.
"The masque was actually a popular form of entertainment during this time. The one in this scene involves Juno and Ceres. Anybody care to guess what these two represent?"
More giggling, this time accompanied by the unmistakable sound of a camera phone. "I head that," she said, turning around. "Put your mobiles away or they're going in my desk. Right then, Juno...anybody?" There were already about half a dozen hands up, more than usual. She pointed at one of them. "Adam?"
"Is that your cat, Miss?"
"What cat?" she asked before her brain caught up. Naturally, half the class helpfully pointed at her desk. The Doctor sat there in full view, paws on the desk, poking through her notes. "Oh, that one..." Already, she could hear whispers of "So cute!" and "Kitty!" and "He's got eyebrows!"
"So Will actually used that line?" he muttered, prompting another round of "Awws" from the girls.
"What's his name?" asked another student.
The Doctor wasn't done with his assessment. "D'you know, I told him that he needed to tone it down a bit on the purple prose. Less padding, more action-"
"Doctor!" hissed Clara.
"His name's Doctor?" someone asked.
She paused to consider a moment. "Yeah...Doctor...Dr Mew." And she really ought to remember that she already has enough problems without being the weird teacher who talks to her cats. "So anyway, back to Juno! And let me remind you that some of this will be on the test, so take good notes. Juno symbolises marriage and family, and-"
"Why'd you bring Dr Mew to school?"
So much for getting them back on task. "I didn't. He followed me. The focus on marriage in this part of the play is Shakespeare's way of getting us to focus on the return to social order and harmony. So when Prospero suddenly remember Caliban's plot-"
"It's overly-long so the other actors can take a break and change costume. Get to the good part!" At this, the Doctor hopped completely onto the desk and batted pages of notes out of the way until he came to the one he wanted. "Here we are! We are such stuff as dreams are made on-"
"Doctor!"
If the class hadn't been distracted before, they certainly were now. A few weren't even bothering to hide their phones to take pictures. "All right! Yes, there's a cat in the classroom! I know it's unusual and silly, but it's just a cat. Just like every other cat in the world, now if you will all give me your attention, I'll try to get through this quickly..."
She turned back to the board. At the same time, one of the bolder students slipped out of her desk and approached the Doctor. "Here, kitty kitty..."
"Oh, no you don't! Clara!" He'd leapt off the desk towards her. Clara turned around and ended up with a cat in her face. He quickly scrambled around to her shoulders. By now, the students were roaring with laughter. "They're doing it again! Come on, at least detention or take away points or something! Do you even do points?"
Well, thought Clara, there goes the rest of the lesson...
"So what did you do?" asked Danny. They leaned against each other on her sofa, watching the video of the incident that one of the students had uploaded to YouTube. Clara had given him detention for it. He didn't care.
"Well, there were only twenty minutes left in class and it wasn't like they were interested in learning anything. So I had them do Shakespeare trivia, the left half of the room vs the right half of the room, and had the Doctor judge their answers."
"And he agreed to do that?"
"Well...I may have used minor threats...like letting the year sevens at him again..."
Danny laughed.
Behind them, something grey and furry hopped up on the back of the sofa. "It's not funny," said the Doctor.
"Yeah, it is." Danny scrolled through his phone until he found some pictures he'd taken earlier that day. "Look, the kids have already made you into a meme. They started posting these on the walls after lunch." The pictures showed the cat-Doctor sitting at Clara's desk, with captions featuring a variety of Shakespearian cat puns.
"What is it with humans and cats?" The Doctor muttered, jumping down from the sofa and stalking off to the TARDIS in the other room. "The ancient Egyptians didn't go for cats as much as you people, and they worshipped them!" His voice trailed off as he went inside the ship and slammed the door.