"I can't believe I'm doing this," John near giggles.
"Neither can I," the Doctor murmurs under her breath. Never in all her years of travelling has she ever let anyone fly her TARDIS. 'What was I thinking?'
You were thinking that he is cute when he pouts.
The Doctor flushes very near indignantly at her TARDIS's accusatory tone. She can't help but feel a little caught. 'Oh, come on, you heard how he was dogging me! He never would have let up if I hadn't given him a little lesson.'
You use the word 'dog', which is funny, given that you use the term 'puppy' to describe his eyes and pouts, my Doctor.
'Since when do you have such an attitude?' the Doctor demands flippantly.
I have picked up your habits, my dear, including the habit of finding John's hands rather warm and—
"Watch it!" the Doctor verbally responds to her sassy little blue box. Her hand goes to pull up a lever John has missed, saving her the need for a cover story.
"Ooh, sorry there, old girl, hope I didn't dent you," John pats the console and receives a sound he chooses to perceive as affection.
'You are really pushing it today, Missy,' the Doctor growls in her head.
You needn't envy, my darling; I can read his thoughts, and they are entirely of you.
'Really?' the Doctor thinks but never gets an answer. A shrill ringing cuts off her stream of consciousness.
"Wha—is that…since when do you have a mobile?!" John blusters from his controls. It would be so much easier to get a hold of her if he knew she had a number! 'I could have just said "hey, I just met you, and this is crazy, but here's my number, so…" no, no, no, that's that song.'
"It's not mine," the Doctor responds in a weighed down tone. She seems to take an awful lot of deliberation time before answering it. Even when she does flip it open there's a good couple seconds before she collects herself: "hello?"
"Hello, Doctor; it's Shaun. You're needed, back on Earth."
John stares. Shaun, as in Shaun Temple, the Doctor's second companion? Why is he calling her? Why is his mobile in the TARDIS? Why does the Doctor have it? Why does the Doctor use it? Why is he calling her?!
"You heard him, Johnny-Boy," the Doctor turns, smiling again. "To Earth!"
"Um," John shifts nervously, "what if I dent it?"
The Doctor smiles at him, "you're not going to dent the Earth, but if you'd like to just watch, that's fine."
John moves behind the Doctor shyly as she takes over again. The old girl hums differently under the delicate fingers of her owner. He still watches closely, so that his next lesson might go fairly smoothly. It is comforting that the TARDIS still jerks, even with the Doctor piloting. In fact, he thinks she might have shaken less when he was at the wheel…well, levers and buttons.
As if to prove him wrong the TARDIS jerks herself to the right, sending her Doctor and John flying. They grasp each other's arms for stability, but are still thrown into a collision. John flushes beet red, feeling his entire front pressed against the Doctor, both of his hands, at an attempt to stabilize them, on either side of her hips. He can't see her face but he's guessing she isn't too happy with him, the way she has tensed up. Slowly - frighteningly slowly - her hand removes itself from under his and hits a lever that corrects their angle. John removes himself from her at an equally cautious pace.
They don't talk about it.
When the TARDIS materializes on Earth the Doctor heads for the door immediately. They've landed in some kind of alley way, with autumn leaves fallen to the ground despite there still being green on the trees. John hangs back, approaching the entrance tentatively.
"Doctor," Shaun greets with a smile.
The Doctor smiles back, but it has a kind of tightness to it. Shaun looks well, she notes. He was always a looker but now he seems…rejuvenated. 'Time away from me has done him some good,' she laments. The smile becomes more natural as she greets him, "Shaun Temple."
John steps out as they're in the middle of hugging, probably for the first time since they parted ways, he imagines. It's an unusual hug. It's tighter than a friendly hug, but looser than a lover's hug, and just short of the tension that his friends had when they hugged their exes for the first time since divorce (or separation or discovery of affairs or whatever). He catches Shaun's eye timidly.
Shaun Temple looks grief stricken, for only a split second. Now, that is the kind of jealous, woeful, wistful expression of a person seeing their ex with someone new for the first time. However, when John takes a half a step the expression is gone, and slowly fades into a friendly, teasing one. "Should'a known; didn't take you long to replace me."
"Oi, don't start," the Doctor chides him, but with none of her usual defensiveness. "Shaun, this is John Smith; John, this is Shaun Temple."
John approaches the way a cat approaches a new toy. He walks on a kind of angle, with his wide, brown eyes twitching a bit nervously. He doesn't mean to come off as such but he's nervous. This Shaun did the Doctor some good in learning about humans, that's certain. If he helped her through heartbreak then John's all for him. Still, he can't shake the slight air of tension coming from Shaun, whom he is sure is also trying very hard to seem friendly. "Nice to meet you; she's told me all about you, really."
"I dread to think," Shaun raises an eyebrow at the Doctor with a tight smile.
"Oh, well, I mean, she mentioned you traveled with her, said you did her some good," John scratches the back of his neck.
"She told you I was pining after her, didn't she?" Shaun slides accusing eyes the Doctor's way and she quirks the corner of her lips downward in habit.
"Well, no one would blame you," John mutters before his eyes catch something, "and it seems it didn't take you long to get over it!"
"What's that now?" the Doctor glances at John for an answer.
"Engaged," he points simply, to which Shaun flashes the ring to her. "Who's the lucky girl?"
"That Veena, from the hospital," Shaun says while twirling the ring.
"Ooh, now there's lovely," the Doctor smiles and pats Shaun on the arm, "she was sweet, so long as she stays away from those friends of hers."
"Oh, but there's business," Shaun turns away and pulls out a walkie-talkie. "This is Agent Temple, Operation Blue Sky is go, go, go!"
John and the Doctor are bombarded with soldiers moving in. There's a fleet of them, a small army, jogging down the street like it's an average mission. John turns to the Doctor. "Is he a soldier now?"
The Doctor only shrugs her lack of excuse as factory workers are dragged about and arrested. Shaun runs ahead and the two follow at a walking pace, finding a large, armored truck. Shaun leads them in, mentioning some anticipation on their front.
"Colonel Mace, this is the Doctor," Shaun introduces her to a tallish man, with thinning hair and sharp features. The Doctor remains casual, hands in her coat pockets and looking him over with an unimpressed expression.
"It's an honor, Ma'am," the colonel salutes sharply.
"At ease, Colonel Mustard, I'm not in the mood," the Doctor drawls lowly.
"You are technically still on file as employed, Ma'am," the colonel points out, apparently willing to forgo the insulting moniker, "you've been called in on investigating the presence of illegal aliens."
"Do you mean aliens like her or immigrants, because it looks like Guantanamo Bay out there! Arresting people in the streets at gunpoint, real noble of ye," John snarks with his arms tightly crossed. "I'm John, by the way, John Smith. Any chance of gettin' a salute, Monsieur Pompadour?"
"I can see why she likes you," Shaun smirks at John, finding his wit and name calling as an easy match for the Doctor's and all the more entertaining for it.
The colonel turns to the Doctor in askance but she sends him a look to indicate that she is neither the maker of that decision nor will she be responsible for John if he doesn't. In the end he turns to John and makes a loud announcement of "sir!"
"Thank you," John nods, feeling greatly satisfied.
"Yesterday," Shaun indicates to the screen, strictly business as ever. "There were 52 deaths under identical circumstances."
"Right across the world, in 11 different time zones," adds the colonel.
As different points light up on the monitor, indicating the locations John speaks up, "they all happened simultaneously."
"Exactly, all at the same moment, all in their cars," says Shaun, possibly a little impressed with John's number ability.
"They were all poisoned, with no traces in any biopsies. The cars have nothing in common except that they have Atmos."
"What's Atmos?" asks the Doctor.
"Even I know about Atmos," John replies, "the thing you put in your car to reduce CO2 to zero. Everyone's got it — my Mum got free Sat Nav and 20 quid in shopping vouchers for introducing her friend."
"And this is where they make it, then?" the Doctor glances down to the factory floor. "Shipping world wide from here; and you think it's alien?"
"We're investigating that," Shaun speaks before the colonel can. He knows very well they won't be getting on very well. He takes the lead, bringing them to a room where the Doctor might be able to work better. The Atmos device is laid out on a table and the Doctor is already looking it over with those eagle eyes of hers. He has missed her eyes (no one on Earth's got eyes like that [but don't tell Veena]).
"Do you know how many cars are on Earth?" A stranger might think she was just asking it so she could answer her own question. Shaun pays attention, though, and he can see from the way she leans she's actually asking John.
"This year's stats said about eight hundred million, I think," John answers without even really registering that he was asked.
"So, if aliens want a device that can be threaded through eight hundred million death traps, I'm guessing it's not to shrink your carbon footprint," the Doctor postulates. She picks up the different components and reaches into her pocket. The glasses she pulls out are rectangular, sleek, feminine, but still quite smart looking.
"Since when do you have glasses?" John raises his brows; he's learning new things about the Doctor all over the place today!
"She still have those things?" Shaun asks as he pokes his head back inside. "You know she doesn't actually need them. Time Lady superiority, she calls it. It's just her wanting to look all marmy."
"It's not that I don't need them, or do need them, I just," the Doctor pauses for a moment, "like them."
"They do look good," John reasons to Shaun before looking at the Doctor again with a sly smile, "rather…attractive."
"Doctor, Agent Temple, I need you with me," the colonel unwittingly breaks the tense air of the room.
Shaun rushes like there's a fire and the Doctor takes her glasses off - unconsciously handing them to John - before dashing off as well. John figures he best take the time to do some digging of his own. He is reminded of Pompeii, and the good he was able to do then. Then there was the Adipose incident, and he did some good then too! Why, he's brilliant, he is!—John decides. The Doctor keeps telling him so he might as well start believing it.
John fiddles with the Doctor's glasses very carefully in hands. Never mind his habit of manhandling his flannel sleeves he's got a full on tactile obsession, he guesses. Aha!: he has found the personnel office! The files are thick like the bricks of the Great Wall of China! Not that he has been, but he hears it's, well, great.
"Hello, what's you?" John asks an empty folder, sitting among the rest. "Sick days, and not a page to be found. The Doctor should see you."
During the walk back, folder in one hand, glasses in the other, John muses. He wonders if he'll pick up the Doctor's little habits. He makes an effort not to fiddle with his hands as much because she tends to stare at them when he does, and he's not sure if that's good or bad. Meanwhile, she has habits of her own, that can be equally distracting. She does that thing with her lips—her naturally pouty lips, even though she complains that he pouts too much. She also ends sentences with "then" a lot. She folds her arms and puts her hands in her pockets a lot, but he does that too. Maybe it's an insecurity thing.
The Doctor and Shaun are talking, rather quietly, John hears. They seem to be sharing a moment, and while he doesn't want to interrupt them, this is important. "Oi, you lot…with your storm troopers and your Sonics; you're just rubbish at this."
"Where have you been?" the Doctor asks him with a smile rather than sneer at the jabbing. She also takes her glasses back from him and puts them on immediately.
"Personnel, where all the useful stuff is, when you're dealing with humans. Years as a temp and you can recognize what's weird and what's not in the office and this is weird: an empty file." John waves it at the Doctor, whose smile only grows as he continues. Out of his periphery the colonel is less impressed, and Shaun seems amused at best.
"Okay, so what's not in the file?"
"Sick days," John declares proudly. He opens the brick thick folder and, true enough, there's nothing to be found. "Hundreds of people working here and not one of 'em is sick? No hangovers, head colds, crybabies, not even a shopping trip for the girls? No one has ever been sick; the workers don't get ill."
"That can't be," the colonel snatches the file just to verify that there is, in fact, nothing in there!
"You've been checking out the building, but you should have been checking out the work force." John cocks his head to the colonel.
"You are good," Shaun nods at the man freely.
"You're brilliant," the Doctor smiles at John proudly.
"So, colonel, the Atmos system was designed by Luke Rattigan, then?" John asks, purposefully trying out the Doctor's habit of ending sentences with that certain preposition. He quite likes it! "The Rattigan Academy is a center that handpicks geniuses, run by an overnight billionaire graduate with no record of a family? Kind of screams mad scientist to me."
"I wouldn't mind investigating that," the Doctor folds her glasses again and puts them back in her coat. "Come on, then!"
"Allons-y!" John hops to and gallops after her. He faintly hears Shaun ask before he's sent to investigate the work force. The smallest, most petty part of John is glad to have the Doctor back to himself.
"Oi, bring us a jeep, would you boys?" the Doctor barks out over the ramp. One snaps a salute, and she smiles, pleased. "Fresh air, geniuses, what else could you want?"
"Doctor, actually, I was thinking," John wonders if now is the time to try out that telepathy thing. Better not, he decides and gathers his nerves. "I think I should go home."
The Doctor feels time slow around her as she dissolves into her thoughts. She wasn't prepared for this. And this soon?—to just go home and leave her? There so much she wanted to show him. He would have loved the Fifteenth Broken Moon of the Medusa Cascade (she may or may not be thinking over if he should know that she does have a name). Oh, and she wanted him to see the lightning skies of Cotter Palluni's world; the Diamond Coral Reefs of Kataa Flo Ko! Oh, but now he wants to go home, and she still wants to do so much with him. She wants to show him so much, and do so much, and most of all she wants to thank him. He has saved her life in so many ways, so many times, and, now…and… "Just poppin' in for a visit, then?
"Yeah, I think I should tell my Mum to get the Atmos out of her car, say hi to my Gramps, all that," John shrugs, oblivious to the Doctor's struggle.
"Right, well, might as well give you a lift," the Doctor smiles to cover up her flummox. "This is, uh, Ross?"
"Yes, Ma'am," the soldier salutes her.
"Okay, the salute kind of works with you," she smiles at him, and John can't tell if she's being flirty or cheeky. They pile into the jeep but are silent, despite the close proximity. Ross drives like a soldier, with his eyes straight forward. The Doctor is unusually quiet, which means she's really thinking hard on something. John knows it's best to let her think rather than try to chatter on. He doesn't mind the hand holding at all.
"Oh, this is my stop," he points out. The jeep slows and he jumps out, the same he has done since he was a kid. The Doctor slides over to his seat to bid him goodbye, hand on the door. "I can walk from here."
"I'll be back soon," the Doctor smiles.
"And be careful!" John shouts after them.
"Onwards, Ross," the Doctor declares just lightly enough to fall short of an order. She watches John disappear in the jeep mirror. Her smiles doesn't fade for blocks yet. "Ross, do you have a family?"
"Yes, Ma'am: a brother and sister, and a mum and dad," the soldier answers honestly.
The Doctor respects his honesty, just hopes it won't get him killed is all. "Good to know, thank you. Just…try to be careful, eh?"
Ross doesn't seem to know how to take this, but smiles in a very human way. "Yes, thank you, Ma'am, I think I will."
"Good," the Doctor ends things on that note. She leans on her hand, gazing out the window. She hates car rides — she misses her TARDIS. The Atmos in the jeep signals a turn and she rolls her eyes. 'Investigating something they can't even get rid of themselves until they know what it is. It's like strapping a bomb to yourself so you can learn how to diffuse it.'
"Oh, get off," Ross snaps at the device's alto feminine voice.
"Must be a pain," the Doctor comments, ready to break her silence.
"Drives me around the bend," Ross smirks as they take a turn around the actual bend.
"Ooh, you timed that perfectly," the Doctor smiles.
"Wasn't sure it was gonna work, to be honest," Ross smiles back.
"Well, mission accomplished," she mock salutes him as they pull up. The Rattigan Academy is just as she expected, all perfect lawns and big stone face. It reeks of pretension and loneliness. Just like the sad looking young man standing in front. He seems to be expecting them, and making a feasible effort to look intimidating. She knows this type, though. "Hello there, darlin', I'm the Doctor, this is Ross."
"Hello, sir," Ross nods by the Doctor's side.
"Show us around, would you, love?" the Doctor asks rhetorically, already making her way inside and around. She notes all the devices silently, marking them in her head. They're decades ahead of their time, she could give them that, but it's not alien, at least not yet.
"Your commanding officer called," says the young man with the ill shaven face.
"I haven't got a commanding officer, don't work for them," the Doctor replies. His wording, she catches, and notes that she might not have a CO but he certainly does. "This technology, all focused on space travel. Looking to move to an alien planet or something?"
"If only that was possible."
The Doctor looks at the boy - Luke, she thinks she remembers John saying - to emphasize her point. "If only that were possible: conditional clause."
Luke takes on a manic look that doesn't phase the Doctor. "Come with me. You're smarter than the usual UNIT grunt, I'll give you that."
"Don't call Ross a grunt, he's a lovely young man, Ross is. And you be nice, I have a feeling you have issues with that," the Doctor points a lazy finger at him in passing, still looking around. Ross looks mildly alarmed at her treatment of the for all intents and purposes scary young man. The Doctor, however, is giving her attention to the teleport pod in the room. The keypad is oddly structured. It's not designed for a human hand, and the technology…ooh, dear, it's SONTARAN! Oh, that's why this boy could design Atmos: he's working with the Sontarans. She feels sad for the misplaced little human. "You're eighteen, and instead of going out with friends you design a system for CO2 dissolution. It might not be so great, though, since cleaner air means more driving, which needs more petrol, so this might do some real damage. You don't look like you care, though, because it's been a long time since you really cared about something, hasn't it? Yes, and that's—"
"Look, I don't know what you're getting at, but your assumptions are only making you look foolish!" Luke begins shouting but the Doctor bends to stare him down.
"Because it has been a long time since anyone cared about you, hasn't it?" The Doctor measures Luke very carefully as she straightens to her full height. He tries to be so much larger than everything around him but he's still a child, as she looks upon him now. "You like being clever, because it's the only thing you have. It's what was there when no one else was, when nothing else made you feel anything but ordinary. You like being clever but clever is lonely, isn't it?"
Luke regards the Doctor in a very defensive way. His shoulders are drawn into himself, to shield his ego from her. She sees too much; thinks too much. She knows too much, with those piercing blue eyes of hers. She looks at him like she can see the entirety of his life splayed out in front of her like a map. "Yeah, I'm on my own, so what?"
"You remind me of someone," the Doctor begins. She's taking a gamble, recounting this story, but it's one she's willing to take. "I knew this boy…a long time ago. He was brilliant, he really was, but he was so afraid of not being the most brilliant. He was terrified that if you took that away he'd just be ordinary, or worse: nothing. So, he tried so hard to be the most clever, and do the best in school, but it never made him feel better. He just got lonelier and lonelier."
"What's your point?" Luke snaps at her harshly but she continues.
"So, one day his sister tells me that he's alone, studying, again. He was always alone, working on something or another. That's what happens when parents aren't around to do their jobs." The Doctor gives pause, hoping it to bridge some gaps. "The boy's father was no help, that's for certain. No, that boy just kept to himself, hoping to prove to himself and the whole wide universe that he could do something worthwhile with himself. He was brilliant, though, he was so brilliant, he just…never believed it."
"What happened?" Luke asks but then shrinks, as if embarrassed to show emotional attachment to the story. "I mean, what happened to the boy?"
"I don't know," the Doctor shrugs, facing away from Luke and Ross, "that's the end of the story."
"This is ridiculous," Luke goes back to being a defensive little twat. Arrogance as his armor and words as his sword he stabs at the Doctor. "That story was so obviously about your own son!"
"I don't have a son, Luke," the Doctor looks directly into his eyes and he physically recoils. "That's how the story ends."
—
"I said so, didn't I, about the aliens?" Wilf chatters at his grandson. "The Doctor, you're safe with her, yeah? I mean, I'm sure you're both responsible, but young love can fry the common senses a bit."
"Oi, Granddad," John scolds his old grandfather, both scandalized and impressed. He softens a bit, thinking on what to say. Wilf knows very well how long he has searched for her, better than anyone. "She's amazing, Gramps. She's just…dazzling! Don't ever tell her I said that, but I trust her with my life."
"I thought that was my job?" Wilf jabs at his best lad.
"You still come first," John assures him, "but I'm so glad I found her, Gramps."
"Don't tell your mother," Wilf leans into John. "I mean it, Lad. I know you'll want to tell her, you're a good boy, but best leave this one to be Chinese whispers."
"Tell who what?" Sylvia stomps her way in as if on cue. "And where have you been, young man? Just up and disappeared, with nothin' but a word to dad that you had found a freelance job!"
"It's nothing, Mum, just," John looks at the untouched mug of coffee in his hands - he has really taken to tea since travelling with the Doctor - and sighs. "I just…I'm all right, you know."
Sylvia seems to at least soften at this. As great a job as she has done making John feel like a cookie-cutter of a man she still manages to love her little boy (in exceedingly rare moments). "Well then start cutting those coupons!"
"Doorbell!" John heralds and springs to get it with his finger still in the air. He doesn't realize Sylvia and Wilf's alarm, seeing as how the doorbell hasn't actually rung yet.
"You wouldn't believe - you wouldn't bl'AVE - the day I'm havin',' the Doctor rolls her eyes on the larger part of the sentence. John feels like she's mocking someone but leaves it alone. He follows her out to the drive without question. She has sent Ross to find a car without Atmos, she told him. That's the most she has said, really, which worries John. She taps around the car a bit before lifting the bonnet, "call Shaun."
John takes the mobile she hands him with minimal fumbling and obeys.
"Is that her? Is it?—is that the Doctor?"
The Doctor and Wilf meet eyes and there seems to be an alarmed sort of recognition going on. "It's you!"
"You two know each other?!" John asks, flabbergasted.
"You disappeared!" Wilf babbles at the Doctor. "Name's Wilf, Wilfred Mott, Ma'am! You're an alien, eh?"
"Well, I'd not go shoutin' it about but it's lovely to meet you properly, Wilf!" The Doctor, forgoing a handshake, simply hugs the man like he were her own grandfather. "You darling button of a man, I didn't know you were John's grandfather!"
"Shaun, hold on, here's the Doctor!"
She takes the phone and speaks rapidly: "Shaun, tell the colonel it's code red Sontarans, they're in the file, and don't send anyone in, UNIT will get massacred, am I clear?"
"Got it: code red Sontarans," Shaun's flat voice answers and hangs up.
The Doctor pushes how odd he sounds into her mind for later before taking out the Sonic. She sets it for Sontaran technology, an out of place pocket of the future tucked into the present.
"Thing is, Doctor, Johnny here is my only grandchild, and I just want to make sure he's taken care of," Wilf speaks up, blatantly ignoring John's embarrassed whining.
"Oh, he takes care of me," the Doctor smiles diplomatically.
"Whatta good lad! That being said, John," Wilf addresses him sharply and out of the blue, "the Doctor here is an extraordinary young lady and you best be a proper gentleman to her!"
"Oohoo, you are my favorite, Wilfred Mott," the Doctor chortles in absolute delight, especially when John only becomes more flustered. A *shing* noise catches her attention and she finds the spikey grey box alive with temporal energy. "There we are! It's a temporal pocket, only a second out of sync with real time. It's hiding something in there… "
"Something wrong with the car?" Sylvia walks up only to back off as she recognizes the blazing ginger hair that pops up. "It's you!"
"You know her too?" Wilf points at the absolute wildness of it all.
"It's the woman from the wedding, before poor Nerys went off," Sylvia bellows.
"Poor Nerys?—she gave up a good man in your son to prattle like a twit and you're thinking of her?" The Doctor only gives partial looks over her shoulder, never meeting Sylvia's eyes. Honestly, the human woman scares her a bit, and she'd rather not incur all her wrath at once. "Get back!"
John reaches to pull the Doctor back as gas fumes from the bonnet. "Doctor, what is that?"
"It's some kind of artificial gas," she can taste it.
"Doctor, what if it's poisonous?" John asks, looking the Doctor in the eyes with his hands on her shoulders. "If they've got poisonous gas in every car on Earth…?"
"They've created eight hundred million weapons," she whispers in horrified affirmation.
"I'm gonna get it off the street," Wilf mutters as he gets in.
"No!" the Doctor jumps from John and starts Sonics every bit of the car. "They've isolated it, it won't open!
Everywhere, car alarms are blaring and gas is leaking from each and every one of them. The air is clouded and it's enough to split someone's head open.
"It's the whole world!"