Michelle lounged in a hammock in the corner of the TARDIS. It connected on one side of the wall and hung from a pipe on the other side. She was reading an Agatha Christie novel, and was clothed in a blue and brown flowered wrap dress.

The Doctor came in through the door of the TARDIS. "Afternoon!" He was carrying two large bags full of oddly colored fruit. "Any reason you didn't feel like coming to market with me?"

"After yesterday's shopping excursion? No thanks. I've had enough of being pawed at by star-struck Phantosians who want me to have their frog children." Most of the grebleks had been spent on obtaining new clothing, though Michelle had got a few items of jewelry and a miniaturized statue of a weeping angel. It had attracted her as being very strange and Gothic looking, but before she could even touch it, the Doctor had insisted on scanning the angel with some device of his. He then assured her he had found it to be a genuine antique and "not dangerous in any fashion." She had merely been confused.

The Doctor did not answer. Michelle put her book down, and glanced over to find him looking at her. "Stop staring at my cleavage."

"What? I'm not! I just wanted to know where the hammock came from!"

"Sure you did. I believe you. Anyway, your ship made it for me, Spaz. It also mixed me a very nice cocktail." She held up a glass. "It's a screwdriver. Not very sonic, though." Michelle mimed reading the Agatha Christie book again, though it was merely to hide a grin. Oh, how easy it was to wind up the Doctor.

"And that's my book!"

"I know! I'll put it back when I'm done. Relax."

"Going through my things? It sounds like we have some trust issues here, Michelle."

Michelle closed the book with a "snap" and leaned back. "Don't have a cow, DW. I trust you. It's just it seems your TARDIS wants to share little clues about you. And provide me with whatever material possessions I want, for some reason." She had a look at the publication page of the novel. "The year 5 billion...something. Ugh, that's too many zeroes for my head to wrap around."

She got up from the hammock and went over to the video screen. "Check this out. I managed to find a Photoshop-type program on the mainframe. If you put your face on Steve Perry's body, you look like a dead ringer for him! Except you need a mullet, which shouldn't be too hard for you to grow..."

"Enough! I'm talking about me trusting you! I have asked you before not to fool around with anything that's in the TARDIS! This is a very delicate machine..."

"It's not all machine. I'm pretty sure part of it is alive. Or more than part of it."

"That's not the point, the point is..."

"The point is what, Doctor? You don't really share anything with me voluntarily, so I kind of have to discover this stuff on my own. Like for example, I know nothing about you. Where do you come from?"

The Doctor turned away. "A planet called Gallifrey."

"Sounds Irish. Do we get to go there at all?"

"We can't. It doesn't exist anymore." He began to manipulate some of the levers on the console.

"Okay...so what happened?"

"It was destroyed."

"By what? Global warming? Those weird critters that look like salt and pepper shakers with toilet plunger hands? The TARDIS showed me some of those, talk about bad special effects for whoever made those things..."

"Stop!" The Doctor angrily punched the console. "Not everything is a joke, okay? I don't feel like talking about it anymore. If you want to know something else, ask the TARDIS."

Michelle was speechless. "My apologies," she finally said after a while. "I'll quit bugging you and let you go back to your work." Trying to make herself busy, she began unloading the fruit the Doctor had brought back into the pantry that had just appeared. With the last one, she took a knife and sliced into the fruit, taking a bite out of it. It tasted like a combination of raspberry and lemon.

"Do you want one?" she asked the Doctor nervously. "They're pretty good."

"I know, I love mongaberries. But I'm not hungry right now."

Michelle sauntered over and sat down on the ledge, munching the fruit and curiously watching the Doctor. "I never see you eat! You're so skinny." She leaned down and pinched his butt.

"Oi! Hands off!"

"Sorry, it's just if you get any skinnier, you'll become two-dimensional."

The Doctor stopped working and stared at Michelle thoughtfully. "Have you ever been two-dimensional before?"

"Uh, no..." She gave him a look as if he were crazy. "Does it hurt?"

"Nawww. Quite fun, actually. I think we should go. Let's do it, let's go now!" He ran to a compartment and pulled out two devices that looked essentially like a button on a string. He threw one over her neck and the other over his own.

"Oh, this looks safe," Michelle said sarcastically. "What did this cost, ninety-nine cents to make?"

"It's supremely expensive and powerful, don't break it. You break it, you buy it."

Michelle shook her head. "So what do I do, just press it?"

"Yep," and he popped the "p" when he answered. "Catch you in the a-ha Dimension!" He pressed the button and vanished in a flash of light.

"Wait for me!" Michelle snapped. "I wonder what the a-ha Dimension is." She pressed her button and also vanished.

************

When Michelle appeared again, she was standing in a stark white background. She also felt mysteriously flat, and without much substance. She looked down at herself and she appeared to be made out of a pencil drawing.

Though she tried to speak, she could not. And yet, she felt she knew what was going on. She was standing on a track, where several motorcycles waited to begin a race. But where was the Doctor?

As she looked, she found him to be on one of the motorcycles. Michelle tried to call out to him, but was unable to get his attention.

A man with no face raised a starter pistol into the air. Michelle covered her ears, waiting for the gunshot. Strangely, it made no sound. But the motorcycles raced past in a blur of black streaks. Following the Doctor was a man in a helmet with the number "13", and a wrench in his hand.

A joyful voice appeared in her head. "Beware the mechanic man with the wrench!"

"Doctor?" A large checkered flag was waved, and Michelle knew he had won the race. There was also music that was playing in the background.

We're talking away
I don't know what
I'm to say I'll say it anyway
Today's another day to find you
Shying away
I'll be coming for your love, OK?

Take on me, take me on
I'll be gone
In a day or two

Suddenly the Doctor was right in front of her. "Come on! Want to see the mirror effect?" He grabbed what looked like her drawn hand and pulled her through an environment of scribbles to some kind of window. "Two-dimensional, three-dimensional. Two, three." He hopped back and forth behind the window, to look like his normal self and back to a pencil drawing.

"Let me come through! I don't like the way this feels." She tried to reach her hand through the window but could not.

"I can't, the story's not over yet!"

So needless to say
I'm odds and ends
But that's me stumbling away
Slowly learning that life is OK.
Say after me
It's no better to be safe than sorry

Take on me, take me on
I'll be gone
In a day or two

"Get them." It was a voice she did not recognize. A dark figure appeared behind Michelle and she turned around. It was the same man in a helmet, the wrench raised threateningly. "Holy crap! It's that mechanic guy!"

"Ooh, how exciting! Time to run. They're called the Wrenchers, by the way." He grabbed her hand again and they began dashing through some sort of hallway.

Oh the things that you say
Is it life or
Just a play my worries away
You're all the things I've got to
remember
You're shying away
I'll be coming for you anyway

Take on me, take me on
I'll be gone
In a day or two

"Doctor! Get me out of here, I don't want to be killed by a drawing of a psycho that's lost a motorcycle race to you!"

They had reached a dead end. The men with the wrenches advanced threateningly. The Doctor tore a hole in the wall and pushed Michelle through.

"Doctor!" As she fell through, she could see the mechanic raise the wrench.

With a thunk, she landed on the floor of the TARDIS. "Doctor?" Michelle looked around frantically for his presence. "Where are you?" He was nowhere to be found.

*****

There was a brief rush of air, a "whoosh", and the Doctor appeared about 30 seconds later. Michelle rushed toward him, but he stepped back.

"It's...not...working..." He appeared to be in pain, switching back and forth from pencil drawing to his whole self.

The Doctor slammed his body into the wall. "Got to...fix it..."

Michelle bit her knuckle nervously. The Doctor looked at her. "You must help me, before I fade away...take it off..."

Her heart slamming in her chest, Michelle dived forward and ripped the device off the Doctor's neck. She threw it into a corner, and the Doctor came back fully, and slumped against the wall. He was drenched in sweat.

The Doctor started laughing. "So much fun! I haven't done that in 20 years! Did you like it?"

Michelle threw her hands up in the air. "You could have been killed!"

"Oh yeah, definitely. Comes with the territory of being a Time Lord."

Michelle just sat there, and then with a sudden urge, rushed over and hugged the Doctor tightly.

Surprised, he chuckled and patted her on the back. For a while, they rested, her head pressed against his chest and listening to the two solid heartbeats.