Round Trip
I hit the deck hard, one hand, both knees, one hand in the air holding the fob watch,
"Ow! Dammit!"
The floor was white and damn hard, the room white with regular marks on the walls, circular marks, the hexagonal white console boxy, and it was deserted. The Tardis felt static, on a planetary size body, I staggered up and glanced at the console, Earth, Iraq, no- wait, 3000 BCE, Mesopotamia, the city of Nineveh. A quick sweep picked out a pah like the Doctor's close by, but outside the Tardis, I opened the doors, looked out and there- an incongruous, stern, silver-haired, dark coated man was walking up the mud brick street towards the Tardis, through crowds of barefoot, dusty people in beige roughspun cloth- who glanced his way, made a sign that looked like an eye and looked quickly away. He didn't seem to notice, but the crowd parted in front of him. He approached the Tardis almost as if he didn't see me, then stopped in front of the door, fixed me with a steel-edged glare, and raised an imperious eyebrow,
"Er..." The gaze was starting to make me feel a bit smaller, "Er..Message!" I collected herself, "10-0-11-00:02, RE 5916.44. You have a date with other...yous. Be there!" I babbled, the old guy was unnerving, he was giving me flashbacks to school, the fob watch in my hand began to tingle, then I moved.
Everything faded out- everything- time, space, spacial position, gravity, radiation, duration- the Doctor- the stork-like, tweed wearing, floppy fringed, oddly sexy, guy- had called it skipping, I thought about throwing up.
I didn't fall over this time, thankfully, just swayed,
"Hallo there!" Said a cheerful voice, "Are you quite all right?"
He had a great big smile, boggle eyes, lots of hair, and lovely manners.
"I've got a message for you."
"Oh really?" He breathed excitedly and I became acutely conscious of his regard, [concentrate, dammit]. I recited the co-ords and date, he nodded solemnly, "Alright," he said, "I'll see what I can do." The tingle started to expand from my hand again,
"Goodbye, Doctor.."
And there he was, crew cut, wing ears, mouth open,
"Hallo." He got that in first, I held up a finger, (I should have written this shit down),
"10-0-11-00:02; RE 5916.44."
"Hang on." He brandished a pen and wrote the numbers down on a piece of paper and handed them to me, "I thought this might help."
"You knew? Why am I doing this?"
"You have to remind us."
"What? Why?"
"Nonsynchronousness."
"What? You made that up!"
"Nope, my other selves' timelines are non-synchronous, memories obtained in a non-synchronous timeline cannot be retained."
"What?"
"It's simple really."
"That's just what you say to take the piss, isn't it?"
"Yeah." He grinned.
I fidgeted for a moment, wondering which of the many things to say to him in the remaining time, hit on one as my palm tingled- "Fancy a game of catch?"
And faded out to the sound of his "What?"
I fell into what looked like a small amphitheatre, subconsciously registering something vaguely sinister about the room [ahh, victorian steampunk], I squinted and gagged a little. There was a glowering, black dressed figure, with a shockwave of grey hair, and- oh yes, there they were- deadly eyes.
"Here you!" A hard scottish accent, "Don't you throw up on my floor!"
That was it, despite the disorientation I started giggling-
"Do you always greet people like that?"
"No, not usually." He laughed, old, old eyes gleaming in the angular face, I peered at him, this severe, too skinny, also oddly sexy, guy,
"Do you know me?" I said, he did,
"Remind me." He said.
A vision in a nightmarish psychedelic jacket whirled around and fixed me with a white hot glare, a pah the size of elephant armour smacked into me,
"What are you doing here?" he demanded,
"Ah- a message! 10-1-11-00:02; RE 5916.44."
He stalked closer to me like a frizzy haired lion,
"From whom?" he demanded,
"You!" I started backing up, "Other you." I amended, he kept coming,
"To do what?" he snapped,
"M-meet yourselves!" he halted right in front of me- leant forward as if to almost sniff me,
"You're a hybrid, aren't you?"
"Yes!" I squeaked,
"And a pretty soggy specimen at that!" I opened my mouth to retort and his forefinger pinned me painfully against the wall just under the collarbone,
"You," he scolded, "could be so much more!"
What?
Panting for breath after that blonde-headed nutjob- and one brain slap of an encounter after another hair-raising one, I arrived somewhere else, this white-roomed Tardis was quiet, the time-rotors hummed gently- station-keeping in the vortex- for a second I thought the place was deserted, then someone cleared their throat, how did I not see the slim white-jacketed man with the floppy blonde fringe at the controls? How did I not feel his pah?
"Hallo. Journey a bit bumpy?"
A bit? I swallowed, trying to slow my heart, "Yes."
"Do you have, say, a message for me?" He prompted gently,
"Y-yes. 10-0-11-00:02; RE 5916.44." He had a stick of celery on his lapel.
"Thank you." He gave me a brilliant smile and began typing on the destination panel, the treacherous tingle began to spread from my palm, he looked up and said "Goodbye."
"For now." He added to empty air.
The Tardis was white again, I groaned, exactly how many Doctors are there?
"Hallo? What are you doing in here?" It was a little bloke with an old face, terrible dusty old clothes and a bowl haircut of thick, dark hair,
"I brought a message."
"Message?" He sputtered, "Who from?"
"Er..you."
"Oh." He was suddenly calm, all attention, all of it on me. "One of those."
I swallowed, "Ah, 10-1-11-00:02; RE 5916.44."
"Thank you." He input something into the console, "How many?" The question startled me,
"What?"
"How many of us have you delivered the message to so far?" He's just worked it out- this is where he figured it out,
"Seven."
"There are twelve of us."
With the one that sent me, that's four more to visit, possibly. I took a deep steadying breath. I could really get to hate skipping.
"You'll be fine." He watched me fade out.
This Tardis was dark, girders up the walls and over onto the top of the time rotor, the whole lot plonked in a victorian sitting room,
"Wow," I swallowed down the omnipresent nausea, "you redecorated." and couldn't stop myself, "I don't like it."
"What?" A frock-coated man with bohemian hair popped into view around the industrially enclosed console,
"Did you base yourself on the Romantic poets?"
"I'll have you know," he straightened the silk waistcoat, "Percy Shelley copied me!"
I chuckled at that, "Message: 10-0-11-00:02; RE 5916.44. Date with density, mate."
He eyed me, "Are you taking this seriously?"
"Nope." I'm sure he grinned before I faded out.
I landed in a heap in a white room,
"Uhn.." Four to go..
"Here, let me help you up." Strong hands pulled me up, I leaned on the console and got a first look around, oh my stars- velvet jackets are naff.
"Who is your tailor?"
"Oh," he pulled the ruffled cuffs down over his wrists, "do you like it?"
"I think you ought to have a strong word with him." I muttered, adding quietly "And maybe your hairdresser." He had a magnificent pile of artful grey curls.
Not quiet enough, his eyes flashed, "Now see here," he started firmly, I lost track of what he was saying for a moment, hoped to hold onto the console and the fob watch. Something buzzed around my head, "Vortex manipulator travel." He shut off the stripy sonic screwdriver, and tutted. I fumbled in my pocket and held out the scrap of paper, he took it from my fingers and took my hand, index finger pressing for a pulse. He reached forward and squeezed his fingers into the nerves at the base of my neck, then up to the back of the jaw. It felt odd, but it cleared my head, I blinked.
"Thanks."
"That's quite alright." He had a wonderful smile.
The tingling climbed up my arm.
I knew instantly which white room this was, I could feel the Tardis being happy to see me, I could feel his mind before I saw him,
"Hallo Kate." His soft, musical voice felt like an electric shock to the chest, it was like an unnoticed pain had stopped, it felt, unnervingly, like coming home.
He knew it was her instantly, when he felt the tentative mental contact he returned it, sending concern and pleasure, curiosity and regret.
She took a deep breath, and said, "Hallo Dad." She sent joy/sadness, belonging/shame, love/wariness, a poor liar, she sniped to distract from her vulnerability.
"That's Doctor." he chided gently, unwilling to fight. He laid a finger on the fob watch forgotten in her hand, one jump remained. He picked it out of her palm and laid it on the console, it pulsed briefly on a countdown, then evaporated in a bright glow, headed home.