*mutters excuses about going back to school and a distracting Kate Stewart/The Rani fanfic*
I'm not going to bother actually making excuses. I'm just a tad useless.
But to make up for it, this is a 7000 word chapter full of fluff. There's a tiny bit of almost angsty feels stuff but it's like 90% fluff so enjoy while it lasts cos we know it won't haha. :D
Thanks to everyone who has reviewed, you guys are fantastic! Anonymous review replies at the bottom.
Enjoy the chapter! You get Torchwood, Jenny, and the Ponds! :D
Jenny lounged at her desk, trying to not look as though she was putting off writing up the report on Weevils. Torchwood was mostly great, she loved the work, the people, the aliens, and of course, the running. But the paperwork was definitely not fun.
"Still no sign of her?" Jack asked from behind her, making her jump.
Jenny spun in her chair and shrugged. "She must have gone home. Weird that she didn't leave a note or a text though."
"Maybe she's just tired and forgot."
"Yeah, probably."
But five minutes later, the papers began to rustle as the Hub was filled with a very familiar wheezing sound. Most of the members of Torchwood flocked to the workstation area where a tall blue box had appeared.
"Maybe it's a good thing Aliya went home," Jenny said to Jack, who nodded from next to her.
The Doctor emerged from the TARDIS and beamed at them. "Alright, Torchwood!" His eyes fell on Jenny and he was quick to approach her and give her a very enthusiastic hug. "How are you doing?"
"I'm good," She replied, grinning as she hugged him back. "How are you?"
"Brilliant, never been better," He said, sounding as though he more-or-less meant it. It certainly made a change from the last time she had seen him, when he had still been mourning his wife. It almost bothered her. After having dealt with Aliya being so distraught for so long, Jenny had hoped that her father regretted evicting her, even if it was just a little bit. But he didn't look regretful at all, just bright and bubbly.
"What did we do to deserve this little visit, Doc?" Jack asked. Rex was standing nearby, not speaking and merely looking unsure about what was going on.
The Doctor made an odd face. "Funny you should ask." He wrung his hands together rather nervously. "Important-ish news. Figured you lot should probably know about it."
"Okay…" Jack lifted an eyebrow. "What's the news?"
The Time Lord's hands pointed back towards the TARDIS. "Easier to show you." Then, to their enormous surprise, Aliya poked her head out of the TARDIS doors.
"Aliya?" Jack and Jenny exclaimed simultaneously.
Aliya stepped out and gave an apologetic shrug. "Yeah. We kind of...worked everything out."
"You said that it would never happen," Jenny reminded her, "You told me all the stuff you guys said!"
"As a certain arse of a Time Agent once said, to forgive is to forgive the unforgivable," Aliya said simply.
"Never knew you cared, Eyecandy," came a drawling voice from behind them. Captain John Hart emerged from around the back of the TARDIS. "And didn't think you were friendly with Bowtie here." He glanced at the Doctor. "Though a more accurate name for you, mate, would be Never Been Shagged. Seriously, why would you wear something like that?"
The Doctor blinked and turned a little pink. Probably to reassure himself, he straightened his bowtie. "My clothes are cool. You know, I was quite surprised when Aliya told me that you turned up here. If I'd known you were a friend of Jack's..."
"Not sure if friend is the right word," Jack said, glancing at Hart, who shrugged.
"So, are you leaving, then?" Jenny asked Aliya suddenly, who nodded but looked sheepish.
"Yes, about that," The Doctor said, "We...may have...already left. Time machine."
"What are you trying to say?"
Aliya ran a hand through her hair. "We've...already been gone for three years," She said embarrassedly.
"Three years?" Again, Jack and Jenny spoke in unison, but this time with John added to the mix.
"You two don't waste any time," The latter said, smirking.
"Don't go there," Aliya snapped, rolling her eyes.
"What the hell is going on here?" With that, Esther Drummond had entered the room. When the Doctor turned to see the newcomer, his eyes widened and he immediately covered them with one hand, only to peek through his fingers.
"Please tell me that I am imagining things," He said, and Jenny frowned, not understanding, while Aliya and Jack seemed to have a realisation.
"You're not, Doctor," The Time Lady told her friend, "This is Esther Drummond. Spatial genetic multiplicity. I did regenerate on top of a rift, it's hardly surprising."
While Esther stared at them with understandable confusion, the Doctor removed his hand and eyed her with new interest.
"Well, this is certainly...a surprise," He said, and then glanced at Aliya, "You could have warned me."
She made a face. "I forgot! Sorry."
"Does someone want to explain what you're all on about?" Esther asked.
"She's American!" The Doctor exclaimed. "Not sure if that's better or worse. Sorry, hello, I'm the Doctor, I'm Aliya's friend and Jenny's dad." He shook her hand and grinned. "Nice to meet you, Esther Drummond. It sounds like they haven't bothered to tell you, but you look identical to how Aliya looked a very long time ago."
"I don't understand."
"They change their faces," John Hart put in helpfully, "That was always the interesting bit about the myths about Time Lords, whenever they're about to croak, they just give themselves a different face and waltz off like nothing happened!"
"Not just a different face, different person altogether," Aliya corrected, "Same core personality, but new face, body, preferences, all of that."
"So...you've had completely different bodies, and one looked like me?" Esther asked, sounding dubious.
"My first one," Aliya said with a nod, "But my eyes weren't brown, and I had freckles. Also, I didn't sound American. And I didn't have your guts. I was...a bit pathetic."
"But how can that even be possible?"
"Spatial genetic multiplicity," The Doctor explained, "Distribution of physical traits across a rift in time and space. She regenerated on top of one, the traits fell through it, and you got them. The universe is funny like that."
"My cousin had a doppelganger who was a Princess on a planet called Tara, and she hadn't even regenerated at all by that point. Sometimes these things just happen, it's more common than you think."
"My old companion Nyssa had a doppelganger who was a socialite in the 1920's. Very common," The Doctor added.
"This is really weird," Esther said, looking as though it was all a bit much.
He just smiled at her, and she seemed comforted by it. "Think about what it's like for me, seeing someone that looks like my friend but isn't."
Her expression shifted to one of thoughtfulness. "I didn't think of that."
That was when Rex returned to the room, though no one had seen him leave. He had Marion with him. The doctor stared at the strange sight before her, and then rolled her eyes.
"Really? This is him?" Everyone in the room turned their heads to look at her. "This is the one you all go on about? A gangly idiot in a bowtie with stupid hair?"
The Doctor blinked and frowned at the newcomer. "Sorry...you are?"
"Unimpressed," The dark haired woman told him flatly. He didn't look like he knew how to respond, but Aliya did.
"I don't recall any of us asking for your opinion," Aliya said coolly, "If you don't have anything nice to say, then go back to your corpses."
That made Marion smirk a little. "At least my corpses don't whine and cry every five minutes."
"She's been gone for three years," Jenny said, pointedly, to divert the conversation, "They made up and went travelling for three years, but since it's a time machine, they were only gone five minutes."
A mix of emotions and expressions seemed to run across Marion's face before a small smile settled on it. "Does this mean you're leaving?"
"Yes," Aliya said, "Consider it a late Christmas present."
"Oh, I will." With that, she left the room, and Rex followed, shaking his head.
The Doctor stared after her. "She's…"
"Horrid," Aliya said, scowling.
"Not as bad as she seems," Jenny disagreed, "Marion's alright really, Dad. Her and Aliya just don't get along."
Jack laughed. "That's an understatement," He said.
Esther sighed. "No, I'm with Aliya, she's-"
"A right piece of work," John Hart said with a nod, "I shot her once."
The Doctor looked rather concerned while Aliya hid a smile. Esther just frowned to herself and bid them goodbye to go back to her work.
Jenny wasn't happy about where the conversation had gone, but she had to accept that not everyone liked Marion. As it was, she had hope that some of them would eventually come around, but it would take time. And work on Marion's part to not be an utter bitch to everyone who wasn't Jenny.
Of course, that wasn't the only thing she wasn't particularly happy about.
"So, just to clarify," She began, starting to frown, "You ran off, and it didn't occur to you for three years that you might want to tell us about it?"
Aliya's smile faded. "It did occur to me. But I wasn't sure what I would say, and…" She took a moment to grin at the Doctor, "I was having too much fun." Looking back at Jenny, who was still frowning, her grin slipped slightly. "But I knew we weren't actually going to have been gone very long, so it didn't matter how long I was away."
"Was it that easy? To just fly away?" Jenny tried to push down the hurt she felt. "Three years...didn't you miss me at all? Didn't you miss Jack?"
"Of course I did," Aliya said softly, her eyes flicking to Jack with an apology in them, but he just shrugged.
"Jenny, he was always going to come first for her. He does for everyone," Jack said, but not with any trace of bitterness, he just spoke it like it was a fact.
"All those times you had to put up with her crying over him, and you don't care that she didn't bother to tell you?" Jenny asked him. Aliya cringed, while the Doctor's face fell as he looked between the three of them, eyes finally resting on Aliya. She just avoided his gaze and shifted her feet.
Jack, however, just shook his head. "No. Because when the Doctor left me, no matter how angry I was, I would have gone with him in a heartbeat if I'd found him again that soon." He and Aliya shared a small smile of understanding.
"But didn't you miss me, Dad?" Jenny's voice was very quiet when she addressed her father. "I mean...three years. That's how long I travelled the universe looking for you. And you just spent that same time travelling the universe, not even visiting me once."
The Doctor met his daughter's eyes, and his gaze was tender and apologetic as he gave her a loving smile and his hand reached out to touch her cheek. "I miss you all the time. But as Aliya sometimes has to remind me, you're a grown woman. I was trying to give you space. And...Aliya and I needed the time on our own to work out...well, what it was we had to work out. If we'd come back earlier, you lot might have given us too many reasons to not keep trying. And like Aliya said...we knew that we'd only be gone five minutes. I would never make you wait, only myself."
Even though they had been gone closer to an hour as opposed to their claimed five minutes, Jenny supposed she couldn't really argue with that.
"Okay," She said, nodding slightly, "But you have to take me on a trip to make up for it."
He beamed at her. "Ha! I've got just the place. I have some friends who want to meet you, it's about time they did." He turned to Jack. "Captain, permission to take my daughter for a brief trip and bring her back in five minutes?"
"Granted," Jack said, grinning.
"Where's Jenny going?" Gwen Cooper had finally arrived. Her green eyes surveyed the scene before her. "What's going on in here?"
"Gwen Cooper, a familiar face at last!" The Doctor exclaimed happily. He rushed forward to excitably shake her hand, while she just stared. "Sorry, suppose you can't say the same, I'm the Doctor, remember me?"
"Um…"
"I told you, Gwen, he changes his face. This is the same guy you saw on that screen a few years back," Jack assured her, and she slowly nodded.
"That's...one hell of a superpower you've got there, Doctor." Then she made a face and looked at Aliya. "Hold on, if you're like him, do you do that too? Are you going to turn up here one day with a different face?"
Aliya smothered a chuckle. "I wish I could say no, Gwen, but while hopefully not for a while, it is a possibility."
"I don't think my brain can do this," The Welsh woman remarked, rubbing her temple, "So, Doctor, are you taking Jenny from us?"
"Just for five minutes," The Doctor promised, rubbing his hands together, "I'm afraid that I'm taking Aliya somewhat indefinitely. Sorry." Aliya rolled her eyes, but Jenny could see a tiny smile on the blonde woman that suggested that she liked the sound of 'somewhat indefinitely'. He looped his arms around their shoulders. "So, into the TARDIS, you two, come on! We've got Ponds to see!"
"Amy and Rory, really?" Aliya asked with a new excitement as the three Gallifreyans went into the TARDIS. "Seeing them again will be great."
Once the Doctor had landed them at the Pond's house, Aliya was quick to get to the door and throw it open in her eagerness to see the humans again. But she was greeted with the sight of the two of them, looking a little pained, while an older man with them stared at the TARDIS with wide eyes.
The box was in the middle of the living room, and they had company. No wonder they were looking at her like that.
"Ah," She said lightly, giving them an apologetic look, "Sorry. In my defense, he was driving." Rory just covered his face with his hand and glanced at the older man, who was still gaping.
The Doctor and Jenny emerged at that point. The former just beamed and waved. "Hello Ponds! How long has it been, did you miss me?"
"Five months," Amy said stonily, "Can't you phone ahead like a normal person?"
"Does someone want to explain what's going on?" The older man asked Amy and Rory.
"Dad, you know when Amy and I first got married and we went travelling?" Rory asked the man, who nodded.
"To Thailand?"
"More like the entirety of time and space. In that police box."
"Good, now that we've sorted all that out, you told me that you wanted to meet my daughter. So, I brought her along." The Doctor looked between his daughter and his ex-companions and grinned. "Amy and Rory, this is Jenny. Jenny, these are my brilliant Ponds."
"So you're his daughter?" Amy asked, eyeing the girl with curious eyes. "God, that's so weird, you're like, not even much younger than him."
"On the outside," Jenny said with a smile, "But I'm only about three and a half years old."
"You're barely older than our son!" The ginger exclaimed with surprise. "That's...way too strange."
"The Doctor mentioned that you had a son, but I'd forgotten!" Aliya remarked, eyes widening. "Can Jenny and I meet him?"
"Hang on, Pond," The Doctor interrupted them suddenly to forcibly turn Amy to face him, and his gaze rested on her very flat stomach. "You're not pregnant."
"I know."
"But you were."
"Funny thing about pregnancy," Rory said as he clapped the Doctor on the back, "There is an inevitable conclusion."
The Doctor was quiet for a moment, before asking slowly, "Another baby?"
The Ponds both grinned, and Rory spoke. "She's asleep right now, but you can all meet her soon."
"So you have one of each?" Aliya asked Amy, who nodded. "What did you call her? I remember the Doctor saying that you used Vincent for your son's name."
"Isabella. Little Izzy Pond," Amy said proudly, "She's a little madam, though."
"Just like her mother," The Doctor said with a grin. "Ah, it's good to see you two again." He hugged Amy and Rory to him very tightly, while Aliya and Jenny just shared grins. Brian just stared at him.
"So you honestly want me to believe that you took these two through time and space in that box? It's unbelieveable!" The older human man said to the Doctor, who just grinned over Rory's shoulder at him.
"But I materialised in your living room, right in front of you."
Brian frowned. "Yes, you did."
"So I'm thinking that the clever part of you already believes me, Brian Pond."
"I'm not a Pond."
"That's not how it works-" Rory tried to remind his old friend, who just shook his head and insisted that it was as he enthusiastically clapped Brian on the back.
"Don't worry, Brian, soon it will seem very normal. In the meantime, this is my friend Aliya," He gestured to the older blonde, who gave a tiny wave, "And my daughter Jenny." The younger blonde grinned happily at the man who eyed them with still half sceptic eyes.
"Daughter?"
"Trust me, don't ask," Amy advised her father-in-law, "Just go with it."
"It's easier that way," Rory agreed.
"Mummy?"
All the adults in the room turned to see three year old Vincent walking in on his small legs, curiosity in his bright hazel eyes as he looked at them all.
"Hey, Vincent," Amy said. She knelt to the ground to scoop him up and tickle his tummy. "Do you remember the Doctor?"
"Yes," The boy said, and the Doctor beamed and pointed, looking to Aliya and Jenny to be sure that they had heard. "He has silly clothes."
Everyone except the Doctor laughed, though Brian's laugh was more of a reluctant chuckle.
"He's so beautiful," Aliya said to Rory as a sappy smile plastered itself to her face.
"Yeah," He replied.
"He obviously gets it from his dad," She said playfully, and he grinned.
"Yeaaah."
"Do you guys want some tea?" Amy asked her guests. She put Vincent down at the coffee table and pulled out sheets of paper and crayons for her son before heading in the direction of the kitchen. The Doctor and Jenny both nodded and followed her, while Brian opted to sit on one of the living room's comfy chairs.
Aliya and Rory knelt down on different sides of the coffee table to Vincent and watched him draw.
"You know, it's funny," Rory said slowly, making the blonde glance curiously at him, "But I've been meaning to mention this for a while. I think...I met you once. Before we found you."
"Really?" She asked, surprised but interested.
"Yeah. When I was in 1819, waiting for it to be 1996. And there was this woman in clothes that didn't match up, who talked to me. You knew me, but I didn't know you. We talked about the Doctor and then you said that you had to go, but to hang in there because it would all be alright in the end."
"But wasn't that a universe that got reset? How could a future version of myself possibly be there?"
Rory shrugged. "I don't know."
"I suppose I'll find out one day. I'll be able to let you know," She said, shaking her head and thinking about the odd possibility. As they lapsed into silence, they were distracted by Vincent. "What are you drawing?" Aliya asked curiously. She didn't speak in a baby voice, and instead addressed him like she would anyone else.
"A train," The boy answered. She hid an enchanted smile as she looked at the rectangular shape that did have circles that could be wheels, but in very interesting places.
"It is a good train?" Rory asked his son, who nodded passively and kept drawing with an adorable look of intense concentration on his face.
"Do you like trains, Vincent?" Aliya asked him. The ginger boy nodded again.
"We rode one to the beach," He replied. "It was fast." Then he peered almost suspiciously at her with those eyes the exact hazel of Amy's and the shape of Rory's. "Do you like trains?"
"I don't think I've ever been on a train before," She admitted, and while Rory looked at her with surprise, Vincent nodded somberly, as if giving condolences, and went back to his drawing.
"You've never been on a train?" Rory asked Aliya, who just shrugged.
"I tend to travel by TARDIS, remember?"
The human man made a face that suggested he hadn't considered that. But that was when the sound of a baby crying came from down the open hallway.
"Rory! Can you get her?" Amy called from the kitchen. Her husband got up from the coffee table. His eyes flicked back to Vincent.
"We've got our eyes on him," Brian assured his son, who nodded and disappeared down the hall. Aliya smiled as she took one of Vincent's spare pieces of paper. But when she reached for one of his crayons, a pudgy, soft hand stopped her.
"No," The three year old said firmly, "My crayons."
She apologised and shared a smile with Brian, who was chuckling a little at his grandson's antics.
Within a minute or two, Rory returned to the room with Isabella - who was no longer bawling - in his arms. As he sat on the couch with her, Aliya came to join him. The moment her eyes fell on Isabella's precious, tiny form, her face split into a huge grin.
"She's perfect," The blonde said with awe.
"Yeah," Rory smiled back. He touched his daughter's face with his fingers. He tore his gaze away and seemed to notice Aliya's dopey, child induced smile. "Do you want to hold her?"
Surprised, her eyes snapped up from the baby's face to his. "Could I?"
He nodded quickly but then hesitated. "Do you...actually know how to hold a baby?"
Aliya laughed. "Yes, Rory. Aliens can be mothers too."
"Fair enough." He slowly held Isabella, and Aliya tentatively took the baby and settled her in the nook of her arm.
"Hello Isabella Pond," the Time Lady whispered, "Nice to meet you."
"Williams," Rory corrected, but she just smiled mischievously.
"You try telling the Doctor that."
"Yeah, but you could say it right. You're reasonable."
"Am I?" She grinned wickedly. "I know very little about human naming convention. Isabella Pond sounds very reasonable to me." Rory looked like he was going to argue, but Isabella's pleased gurgle stole the attention of both of them. "I think Isabella thinks it sounds reasonable too." She lent the infant her finger, and the tiny fist clasped around it and didn't let go.
"You're good at this. Almost as good as Amy," the father of the baby noted. Aliya smiled down at the child in her arms.
"Once a mother, always a mother."
"You were a mother?" His shook was obvious and understandable. He saw her as being similar to the Doctor, who never came across as a parent; even now, with his daughter Jenny in the other room with him and Amy.
Aliya nodded in response to his question. "A long time ago." Somewhere along the line, the thought of her son had stopped being crippling and become just a pang in her chest. With a beautiful child like Isabella right in front of her, how could she be sad?
There was at least a minute it silence between them after that, until Brian spoke up.
"You said a long time ago. At your age, how long ago could it have been?"
"The Doctor and I are much older than we look, Brian," Aliya said simply. "Luckily, despite how long it's been, I don't seem to have lost the knack!"
"How long ago would that be?"
"Half a millennia or so," Aliya said wryly.
"They're aliens, Dad, I thought you'd realised," Rory told his father. "How else could we travel through time and space?"
"If you ask the Doctor, Brian, I'm sure he'd be happy to show you around the TARDIS. That would convince you," suggested Aliya.
"The TARDIS?"
"The police box, Dad."
"Oh. Couldn't you just show me?"
Aliya shook her head. "Not my TARDIS to show. Besides, I'm letting go of this little one yet." She jiggled the infant and made silly faces at her. Isabella made a small giggling noise. Then, on a slightly nostalgic whim, the blonde began to sing a Gallifreyan nursery song. It spoke of orange skies and red grass, and shining sunlight and the glass of the Citadel.
Rory and Brian only exchanged a few words, clearly preferring to listen. But as the song came to an end, another voice joined in from behind them quietly for the last few lines.
They turned their heads to see the Doctor leaning against the doorway, smiling as the final word of the song left his lips. Amy and Jenny stood behind him. The latter looked utterly charmed, probably because she understood some of the lyrics.
"I think she liked it," Amy said, eyeing her daughter, who was cooing happily.
"I like to think so," Aliya agreed.
"Silly words," Vincent said, still not looking away from his crayon drawings.
Rory and Brian exchanged a look before the former spoke. "What language was that?" At the question, the Doctor and Aliya smiled odd little smiles as their eyes met.
Amy had caught on, though. "That was your language, wasn't it?"
"Yes Pond." The Doctor came to sit down on the couch next to Aliya so that he too could admire the baby. "She's a lot more like Rory than you."
"Yeah, her and Vincent both have his nose, what are the chances?" Amy laughed.
"Actually, her nose is very much her own," the Doctor said, touching the mentioned nose with his fingertip, "But it's gonna be a strong one, like his." He and Aliya grinned at each other over the baby while Amy, Jenny and Brian laughed at the joke about Rory's nose - a topic that never grew old.
Rory just scoffed and looked to his son with approvals eyeing the nose which the two of them certainly shared.
Jenny peered at her own father. "Do I look like Dad at all?"
"Regeneration can make family resemblance a bit tricky," He said, smiling at her, "It's a complete scrambling of all the possible genetic combinations."
"That being said, I think I can see a bit of his Fifth self in there," Aliya told her thoughtfully, "And of course, a bit of his previous one too, though I knew that face less well."
"She looks more like you than him," Amy said to Aliya, who just shook her head.
"She's one hundred percent Doctor, through and through," She said.
"She never lets me forget it," Jenny agreed. "Keeps warning me off decorative vegetables!"
"Oi!" The Doctor exclaimed. "I pulled that off." The three humans looked at him questioningly. He just shut his mouth and mumbled something under his breath, about 'never mind', 'outnumbered', 'women'.
"The Doctor here used to wear celery on his jacket," Aliya said to Isabella, much to the amusement of the girl's parents, "He was very cute, but very silly."
Rory frowned at his friend in tweed. "Celery?"
The Time Lord made a face. "Let's not go there." Then, in Gallifreyan, he said, "Tell them about the rainbow coat and I won't bake you anything for a month."
His counterpart didn't seem bothered. She just rolled her eyes and shook her head. "You're no fun. He's no fun, is he, Isabella?"
The baby gurgled, making the Doctor clap his hands excitedly.
"Ha! She thinks I'm very fun, she likes my chin!" He exclaimed.
"Um...what?" Amy asked. Meanwhile, Aliya just lifted an eyebrow.
"I speak baby."
"No, you don't," Amy said firmly, and Rory nodded to show his agreement.
"I speak everything."
Aliya was eyeing him dubiously. "I know, but...baby? Really?"
"Come on, Aliya, you must know if he's lying, you come from the same planet."
"But I only ever took the Basic Languages Course," Aliya admitted, "Which is learning the dominant language of the planet during its most noteworthy time period. Like English with Earth. The Doctor took the advanced class - every single language, ever." She frowned. "So...for all I know, he could speak baby. But most people didn't bother with anything more than the compulsory Basic one. TARDISes have translator circuits, so it's not necessary."
"Unless it breaks," Her friend argued in defense of himself.
"I specialised in engineering and mechanics, I was confident in my ability to repair it," She all but snapped, rolling her eyes.
Just then, Vincent tried to hide a yawn, but with her mother vision, Amy spotted it.
"Time for your afternoon sleep, isn't it, Vincent?" She scooped him up despite his protests. "Say goodbye to everyone." The boy gave a small , reluctant wave and then sulked as his mother carried him out if the room.
"So, what do you do for fun around here?" the Doctor asked Rory and Brian. "Do you have board games? I love board games."
"Er...yeah," Rory answered, getting up and crossing to a cupboard filled with at least half a dozen multi-coloured shallow boxes. "Scrabble, Trivial Pursuit, Candyland, Monopoly-"
The Doctor clapped his hands. "Ooh, Monopoly's great, we should play that."
"It takes hours," the nurse reminded the excitable alien, who just shrugged.
"Is that a problem?"
Rory thought for half a second before shaking his head. "No, sounds good." He took the box from the cupboard and put it on the table. "I'll warn you, though, Amy's ruthless."
The Doctor just smiled. "I learnt from a cockney shopgirl who laughed in the face of a Dalek. Do you think she wasn't?" Rory looked doubtful, while Aliya grinned at the thought.
"Would that be the notable Rose Tyler?" She asked.
Her friend sighed. "I never stood a chance." He appeared almost forlorn for a moment before brightening. "But this time, I'm going to win."
"Win what?" Amy had returned to the room. Her hazel eyes landed on the Monopoly box and she smirked. "You lot sure you to get thrashed?"
"Just you wait, Pond," The Doctor said, making the ginger grin and sit next to the table. She began to set up the boar.
"You're going to have to teach Jenny and I how to play this game," Aliya said with a frown as she watched the cards and tokens getting organised.
Brian got out of his chair. "I'll take Izzy, I'm not fussed on playing, I'd rather watch the mayhem."
Isabella Pond was passed to her doting grandfather, and the rules were explained to the blonde Gallifreyans who had never played. Then came the dilemma of token choice. After a bit of arguing, they were allocated thusly:
Amy: Cannon
Rory: Car
The Doctor: Hat
Jenny: Shoe
Aliya: Dog
Amy and the Doctor were quick to buy anything they landed in, while Aliya and Jenny took a while to catch on but eventually hit their stride and worked together despite the Doctor protesting that they were ganging up on him.
Aliya, who was locked in a constant war with the Doctor over board game victories, was quick to get very competitive. While Jenny and Rory didn't last long and were out within forty five minutes, Amy and the two Time Lords pressed on. Amy soared ahead and played both of them like fiddles with her hoteled yellows and three housed dark blues. But the Doctor and Aliya were too busy spending half an hour trying to bankrupt each other to care. Her hoteled oranges and light blues had done her proud but weren't enough against his hoteled reds and the greens which had more houses every turn.
A run in with a four housed green finally did her in. With a scowl and a huff, Aliya handled her money over to the Doctor and removed her dog token from the board.
It took another half an hour, but Amy finally wore the Doctor down, and Park Lane with a hotel bankrupted him.
"I told you so," Rory said without looking up.
They ended up staying for dinner, but eventually it was time for hugs, goodbyes and promises to visit again soon. The Doctor hugged his Ponds very tightly several times, while Jenny reiterated how nice it had been to meet them, and Aliya bid her new favourite human, Isabella Pond, goodbye before also saying goodbye to Brian.
Once back in the console room, the Doctor went quiet and glanced at his daughter.
"So...back to Torchwood, then?" The reluctance in his voice was obvious.
"Or...I could stay for a few more hours?" Jenny asked with a tentative smile. Aliya did her best to not squeak happily and instead hugged the girl around the shoulders, beaming.
"Yes!" She and the Doctor said at the same time.
"Can I have more of a tour of the TARDIS? I still haven't seen much of it."
The Doctor giggled with delight. "Course you can." He offered his daughter his arm. "Shall we?" They scaled the stairs and walked through the corridor with Aliya some way behind. Jenny was introduced to the swimming pool room, the library, the garden with the large chess board, Aliya's room, the music room, and the small kitchen with blue walls that Aliya and the Doctor currently favoured.
Finally they came to the Doctor's favourite room, which Aliya had christened 'the room of junk', much to his dismay.
"The room of gizmos!" He declared with a dramatic flourish of a door open and a spread of his arms. "In this room, it is impossible to be bored, impossible to even think about being bored, because there is always something in here that results in fun."
"It's his room of pointless junk," Aliya said with a roll of her eyes.
"How can you call something like that junk?" The Doctor asked, pointing to a large clay Zygon a few metres away.
She blinked and frowned with puzzlement. "Why do you even have that? How does that even exist?"
"One of my old bodies liked to make them to cheer himself up sometimes," He replied as if that were perfectly normal, "There's quite a few of them around, but most are a lot smaller."
"These are neat," Jenny said as she picked up a pair of wooden swords.
"Hey, you said you were good with a sword, Doctor," Aliya recalled, "Jenny should put that to the test."
"Why me?" The girl asked.
Aliya shrugged. "Natural soldier. You're bound to be better than me."
Jenny grinned and tossed a sword to the Doctor, who to their surprise, caught it deftly. "Alright then, Dad. Show me what you've got."
"Gladly."
And so a duel began. They swung their swords and scaled the piles of random objects as if they were hills and simply part of the terrain. The Doctor jabbed and swung with tactics that suggested the skills he had mentioned to Aliya while in the underwater jail, but Jenny moved with a natural grace and affinity for battle.
The Doctor almost lost when he tripped over a LEGO tower, but managed to recover and quickly win with some incredibly fancy swordplay that had Jenny's sword clattering to the floor and the girl standing there not looking sure how it had got there.
Aliya burst into applause at the fine display. "That was very interesting to watch!"
The Doctor glanced at Jenny. "Isn't she supposed to cheer and tell us that we 'rule' or something?" He looked to Aliya. "Isn't that what you're meant to do?"
"Rule?" Aliya repeated. "You don't rule anything, why on earth would I tell you that?"
The Doctor turned thoughtful. "Good point. Why do humans say that?" He frowned at her. "Still, as the winner, I'm fairly sure that you're supposed to cheer for me when I win."
"But I wanted Jenny to win," She answered with a smirk, getting an offended face out of him.
"But you're my best friend, not hers!"
"Possessive, are we, Dad?" Jenny asked her father with an amused grin.
"No!" Then he considered it and looked at Aliya curiously. "Maybe a little."
As she laughed at that, it occurred to Aliya that it was actually the first time that Jenny had really seen Aliya and the Doctor interact. The first time and only time they had all been together, the Doctor had been angry at Aliya for telling him of Jenny being alive, and after that she had only seen Aliya, who had been first waiting for the Doctor and then trying to find her feet without him.
This was the first time she was seeing them as the good friends they were. Aliya could only hope that Jenny thought that what she saw was a healthy, positive thing that she would occasionally want to be a part of.
Like a family, Aliya unexpectedly thought, only to look at the Doctor, resist the urge to blush, and quickly shake her head. Well, not a family. But something similar. Ish. Maybe.
Her thoughts were soon interrupted by the Doctor finding a pile of water pistols and deciding that they would all play. So after all rushing off to find taps to fill them up, they came together for a mad, disorganized and utterly enjoyable water pistol fight which heavily involved Aliya and Jenny ganging up on the Doctor, until Jenny switched sides and decided to help her father beat down Aliya until she was soaked from head to toe.
Eventually it was time to take Jenny back to Torchwood. With large smiles, light hearts and very wet clothes, they landed the TARDIS in the Hub.
"I'm back!" Jenny announced to the room. Jack, Esther, Rex and Gwen all looked up from their workstations. "How long was I gone?"
"Ten minutes?" Gwen ventured. Esther just nodded without really looking up from whatever she was typing. Jenny laughed at that, mostly to herself.
"Have fun?" Jack asked from where he had been peering over Gwen's shoulder. Jenny nodded.
"I've been gone for hours. Met some of Dad's friends, played a game called Monopoly, bet Dad in a sword fight, and then we found some water pistols."
Jack's eyes went from Jenny to the Doctor and Aliya behind, his eyes lingering on the latter who was drenched from head to toe. Her hair hung limply and dripped onto the concrete floor of the Hub.
"I can see that," He said with a twitch of his lips and merry eyes.
Aliya gave him a sheepish smile as she pushed her hair out of her eyes, and the Doctor just kept looking at her like he was proud of his handiwork. "Where are Hart and Bitch on Legs?" She asked, borrowing Hart's nickname for Marion.
"Shagging on the med bay floor," Hart's voice answered. They turned to see him leaning against the entrance to the med bay, his trademark half smile-half smirk ever present. Aliya rolled her eyes. "Admit it, Eyecandy, you missed me a little in three years."
"I missed your singing and little else," She told him. He looked almost pleased by that, but before he could answer, the med bay's true inhabitant came into view.
Marion Narke took in the scene in less than a second before scowling and sighing. "Back already?"
"I knew you'd miss me if I stayed away too long," Aliya retorted sarcastically.
"Funny." The doctor shifted her gaze to the workstations. "Gwen Elizabeth Cooper, if that report isn't through to my computer in ten minutes, heads are going to roll."
The other dark haired woman looked up, rolled her eyes and grinned. "Oi, don't play the middle name game with me! I know yours is Laura and I'm not afraid to use it if I need to, Narke."
"Yes, because my middle name terrifies and shames me down to my very core," Marion replied flatly, "You'll have to do better than that, Cooper."
"One day I'll work out what's in that head of yours."
"I seriously doubt it."
Jenny just laughed. "Yep, definitely good to be back."
"I should hope so," Marion said to her with a small smile that looked reasonably genuine.
"We'll leave you to it, then," The Doctor said, and gave his daughter a tight hug and a kiss on the forehead.
Jenny hugged Aliya too. "Don't be strangers. You should do visits like this more often."
"Oh joy," Marion drawled.
"Are you incapable of not butting in with unnecessary remarks?" Aliya snapped, making the Doctor look at her with surprise and abruptly move the conversation onward.
"Sounds good to me," He said to Jenny mildly..
"Get out of here, then," Jenny said with a grin, "You're in my space."
"Yes Ma'am," Aliya snorted, before let her eyes shift to immortal man in suspenders. "Bye Jack." Then she looked around the room at the other members of the team. "Nice to see you all. Bye!"
"Nice to see you two made up," Jack said with a large grin, "You kids be good."
"Catch you later, Eyecandy." Hart winked at her saucily. "Keep an eye on Never Been Shagged here and see if you can't get him laid." He paused and eyed them for a moment. "Or take care of it yourself. That works too. You could use a good shag, sweetheart."
"Time to leave?" The Doctor asked Aliya quickly as they both found themselves pointedly ignoring the comments..
"Yes," She said, rolling her eyes and burying her embarrassment under the knowledge that Hart would say anything to cause trouble or make them squirm.
After a slightly awkward pause, he glanced sideways at her. "One-on-one match with the water pistols?"
"You're on."
The two of them scrambled for the police box while Jenny and Jack heartily laughed.
Sorry again for the delayed update, I'll try and be better from here on out. The next chapter will be very fluffy too.
If you haven't already and like the Rani or Kate Stewart and don't mind a bit of femslash then you should check out my fic about them! I know it sounds super weird but I've been told that it totally works, and have written it very carefully and deliberately.
Also, I WENT TO THE DOCTOR WHO SYMPHONIC SPECTACULAR IN WELLINGTON AND PETER DAVISON HOSTED IT I WAS IN THE SAME ROOM AS HIM I STILL CAN'T EVEN PROCESS THAT BUT IT WAS THE BEST DAY OF MY LIFE IT WAS BEAUTIFUL
Love you all,
-MayFairy :)
Anonymous Review Replies
Guest/Danni - That's so great that you love Daliya! Hopefully this chapter was satisfying in the fluffiness with a tad shippiness. Your review made my day when I got it and I really wished that I could have replied properly. Hope to hear from you again, and thanks for the review!