Chapter 12

Jackie Tyler relaxed on the plush couch of her oversized living room whilst three-year-old Tony stacked blocks carefully on top of the coffee table. The ginger-haired little boy was taking his stacking seriously, so Jackie browsed television on her tablet, thinking she could watch something and have a nice cup of tea when Tony went down for his nap. The week's top show was some American sci-fi import about time travellers. Jackie scoffed, not needing any more of that in her life. Thinking of time travellers—or at least former ones—Jackie wondered if she ought to call her daughter. A full day had passed since Rose left for Cardiff with no word from her, but on the other hand, Rose had disappeared for months at a time when she was off gallivanting around with the Doctor.

"Tony, it's time for your nap," a soft voice called as the Tyler's nanny, Becky, entered the room. The toddler knocked his blocks to the floor in protest.

"Clean those up, sweetheart, and mind Becky," his mother admonished. He turned to his mother to whinge but stopped at Jackie's stern look and started putting his blocks back in their box. He stopped suddenly with a block in his hand and looked around the room. Jackie frowned at her son, but soon she heard it, too. A metallic wheezing noise. A noise she would recognise anywhere.

Jackie bolted for the back porch as the bewildered nanny stared after her. The sliding door was flung open and she scanned the expansive garden. There was no way she could miss a blue police box amidst the green of the garden, but it wasn't there. But there was no way she could have imagined that sound, was there?

She looked around again. Lawn, gazebo, flower garden, a little fountain that was emptied before Tony was born, a couple of sheds.

Wait, two sheds? Jackie could have sworn there was only one.

The door of the second shed swung open and out stepped Rose followed closely by the Doctor. Jackie ran to hug her daughter and then eyed the familiar brown-suited Doctor suspiciously with her hands planted firmly on her hips.

"All right, now tell me, which one are you? And why does the TARDIS look like a garden shed? Did you get tired of the blue box? How did you get back here, anyway? If you think you're just going to swan off with Rose and take her back to a parallel world you've got another think coming. Not to mention it's not fair to the other you that you left here. He's not so bad, really. He loves Rose, and he's a lot better at staying out of trouble than you are."

Rose tried several times to interrupt her mother's tirade without success. The Doctor, to Rose's great surprise, waited patiently for Jackie to finish. Well, patiently for him, at least, as one Converse kept a steady rhythm as he tapped his foot on the lawn.

"Well," Jackie demanded finally, "what do you have to say for yourself?"

He took a deep breath like he was about to dive into a pool. "I'm the Doctor, but you already know that, the part-human one to be precise. I don't think there's any other part-human, part-Time Lord Doctor, so that should be a sufficient identification. This TARDIS has a working chameleon circuit, so she can analyse her surroundings and pick an inconspicuous disguise—in this case, a garden shed. I'm rather fond of the blue box, thank you, and I should think it's rather obvious how we got here." He paused briefly for another breath (how did Jackie ramble on so long without a respiratory bypass?) and took Rose's hand firmly in his own.

"I may very well swan off with Rose if she wants to, though I think she's already been to enough parallel universes for one human lifetime. Can't have her tearing holes in the fabric of reality, after all. And I do love Rose, but I've never been very good at staying out of trouble."

"What?" Jackie squeaked, her mouth gaping open. She looked from the skinny madman to her daughter, who was obviously trying to stifle a laugh.

"Please don't make me say all that again," the Doctor pleaded.

"So you're not...him?" Jackie looked at Rose for confirmation. "Then how'd you get the TARDIS?"

"Can we talk inside, mum? I'm starving." Rose draped an arm across her mum's shoulders to steer her towards the house.

"Oh all right," Jackie sighed. "You're just in time for tea."

Rose looked over her shoulder at the Doctor and mouthed "tea" with narrowed eyes. "What day is it?"

"Saturday. Are you feeling all right sweetheart? You only left yesterday." Jackie paused in the entryway to the house and looked from Rose to the Doctor and back. "Didn't you?"

"Not bad for her first time out," the Doctor said proudly. "And I do like Saturdays."

"Doctor?" A small and slightly sticky hand grabbed onto his fingers. "Will you tell me a story?"

He ruffled young Tony's ginger hair, tamping down a small amount of woe that he never would achieve his dream of being ginger, and let himself be led into the living room adjoining the Tylers' enormous kitchen. He glanced back towards the kitchen table where Rose and Jackie were chatting away, oblivious to his presence.

"All right," he said, thinking. "A grand adventure, I suppose." The boy nodded. "With aliens." He nodded again. "Are you sure she's your mum?" he asked doubtfully, tilting his head towards Jackie. "You're awfully quiet."

Tony just widened his eyes, the same shade as his big sister's.

"Never mind that. Probably can't get a word in edgewise. Right then. Aliens. Big, giant aliens." He wiggled his hands menacingly and the boy laughed. "Fencorso Three, the land of giants. Of course, they don't think they're giants, but I don't even come up to the average Fencorsan knee. It's just a lot of hairy shins and oversized shoes.

"The Fencorsans are quite large and therefore aren't terribly dextrous." He contemplated the three-year-old and clarified. "They're rather clumsy. Big hands with thick fingers. Anyway, they were having a problem with their central power plant, and since I'm quite clever, they asked me to take a look. Turns out it was just a couple burnt wires on an old Chula power converter, but it was too small for them to repair. Simple for me, really."

"Simple?" Rose asked sceptically from the doorway, arms crossed over her chest. "Go on, tell him what happened next."

"Well, uh...there was a huge explosion!" He added sound effects and pantomime gestures for Tony's benefit.

"And why was there a huge explosion?" Rose prodded.

"I...er...might have put the power converter in backwards. Which...may have resulted in it overheating and setting off a chain reaction," the Doctor said quickly as his ears turned slightly pink.

"Causing a planet-wide blackout that the Fencorsans thought was sabotage, so they trapped us in a giant fish tank!"

"Which I got us out of," the Doctor muttered.

"After an hour in a glass box that smelled like fish, and by shattering the glass with your sonic. There was glass everywhere!"

"Yes, well in the end, I helped them build a new, more efficient power plant. They're better off."

Rose dropped to the couch beside him, leaving not even a millimetre between them. "And yet I remember them asking us never to come back."

The Doctor looked slightly miffed. "Well, it wasn't a terribly interesting place, anyway."

Rose smirked and was about to snog the pout right off his face when her mother interrupted.

"Oi! Not in front of the C-H-I-L-D," Jackie exclaimed far more loudly than necessary. "Besides, your father will be home any minute now."

Rose sighed and pulled away. The Doctor tried to follow her for a moment until she stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. "Mum, we have to go get supplies for the TARDIS."

Jackie's eyes narrowed with distrust. "Help yourself to the pantry. Got half a Tesco in there. Even got some of that marmalade he's always sticking his fingers in."

Rather than being embarrassed, the Doctor seemed to brighten at the mention of marmalade. Jackie directed them to a pantry the size of Rose's old bedroom that was stocked from floor to ceiling. The Doctor looked around the room, gave a satisfied nod, and started walking briskly towards the back of the house.

"Where's he going?" Jackie asked Rose. A terrible idea occurred to her. "Oi! You are not parking your ship in my living room!" she shouted after him.

Two and a half minutes later, the TARDIS engines could be heard within the Tyler mansion. Jackie scooped up her son in her arms and glared at her daughter. The sound remained slightly muffled and nothing appeared in the living room or kitchen, so Rose stuck her head in the pantry. There, in the middle of the room stood a large wooden cupboard that barely cleared the ceiling and hadn't been there earlier. The door swung open to reveal the Doctor grinning madly.

"Perfect!" he exclaimed, giving the exterior of the TARDIS an affectionate pat.

Rose bit her lower lip as she regarded the TARDIS's new camouflage. "I keep expecting a big blue phone box. I'm worried I won't be able to find her."

"You think it's difficult? I've had centuries of her looking that way. This new look is quite a sight. Oh, but this will help." He reached into his pocket and withdrew a silver key on a familiar ball chain.

"It's just like my old one." She grabbed it and put the chain over her head.

The Doctor put a hand to the back of his neck and looked guilty. "Er, it is your old one. I borrowed it. To find the new TARDIS. Same lock and everything, you know."

"We need to work on your definition of borrowing," Rose chided as she poked him in the chest. The Doctor grabbed her wrist to pull her closer and took advantage of the relative privacy of the pantry to claim the kiss he'd been denied earlier.