Chapter 3 - Reunion

"Rubbish!" scoffed Barbara. "You can't be our great-grandfather, you just can't."

"Why not?" asked the man claiming to be the Doctor.

"Because our great-grandfather was a grumpy old man with white hair, and he loved our mother very much. Our mother is older than you!"

"Oh, yeah? I seriously doubt that your mother is more that 1,568 years old!"

Ian gaped in astonishment. "You're over a thousand years old? Wow."

"This is no time for admiration, Ian," said Barbara crossly. She turned back to the man. "Look, you must be ill. You're not our great-grandfather."

The man just smiled knowingly. "Ok, then. Why don't you take me to your mother and ask her yourself?"

Before the twins could answer, David Jr piped up. "Let's do that, let's do that! Come on," he said excitedly, pulling on the man's jacket and leading the way. Ian and Barbara glanced at each other, shrugged, and followed.

Susan was proof-reading her work reports when the doorbell rang. Sighing in frustration, she got up to answer it. Those reports were important, and had to be submitted tomorrow, but she knew she'd never get them all done in time. Despite the capabilities of her Time Lord brain, ten reports in twelve hours was just not possible. When she opened the door, she saw a young man surrounded by her three children.

David opened his mouth to speak, but was interrupted by the man. "Good afternoon, Mrs Campbell. I found these three playing on some girders around the old bridge. Dangerous thing to do; they could've fallen and sprained their ankles," he said, giving her a wink.

Susan eyed the stranger with suspicion. He vaguely reminded her of someone, but she didn't know who. And there was that reference to her falling from girders and spraining her ankles at the beginning of her last adventure with her grandfather. But how could the stranger know that?

Regaining composure she thanked the man and beckoned the children inside.

"He thinks he's your grandfather," whispered Barbara as she passed her mother on her way into the house. Susan made no indication that she had heard what her daughter had said, but her brain was processing the information. She knew that it was extremely likely that her grandfather had regenerated by now, but she just couldn't believe that he would look so young, if the stranger in front of her was her grandfather. She had to find out whether the man's claim was true. She hoped it was; she hadn't seen her grandfather for twenty years.

"Come in, come in," she said, beckoning the man inside. "Please excuse the messy table; I've got some reports I have to submit..."

But the man wasn't listening. He wandered over to the table, picked up a pen and started correcting the reports.

"Wrong conditional clause...doesn't make sense..." he muttered under his breath, hand flying across the paper.

Susan just stood and stared in shock as a complete stranger corrected her reports in record time. After 10 minutes, all her reports had been fully corrected.

The man looked up. "Not bad, but the fifth one lagged a bit in the middle, and the eighth didn't make much sense, but I fixed them all up," he said, a childish grin splattered across his face.

"Who are you?" asked Susan, in a mixed state of wonder and awe. Could this man really be her regenerated grandfather?

The man's demeanour changed. His eyes lost their glow of excitement and his grin was wiped off his face. "Susan," he said softly, "Don't you recognise your own grandfather?"

Susan stared into the stranger's eyes, searching, but the man had other ideas.

"Here, use telepathy. Look into my mind," he said. Susan did exactly that, and, as soon as the image of an old man flashed across her mind, she knew at once that his claim was true.

"Grandfather?" she asked hesitantly.

"Hello, Susan," said the Doctor, taking a big gulp of air, trying to hold back his emotions. "I've come back."

Author Note: From Susan's perspective, the events of 'The Five Doctors' haven't happened yet.