DAY 18,256

Back to the Future

Thirteen

"This is way out of my depth, Frost," the Doctor hissed angrily at Celia, holding her pen she had just been using to mark draft coursework essays in a tight fist. She didn't really know anything about marking essays, but thought they were all doing a very good effort. Except Nathan Cross, who had spent the whole lesson drawing photo-realistic penises on his paper. Although, that in itself was a good effort. Maybe he could make a career out of it someday? He could put it on his CV.

"Teaching is out of everybody's depth," Celia said, unforgiving. She hated Celia Frost, head of the physics department and newly-appointed head of behaviour in the staff-shuffle the new headmistress, Lorna Moore, had been doing (she had made Clara the head of English, though.) "They're in your form and your wife has a lesson at the moment and can't take time out to deal with it. Honestly, woman, get over yourself."

"Don't talk to me like that," the Doctor said threateningly, standing up, "You haven't got any idea who I am."

"You're my subordinate, Oswald. I tell you what to do when it comes to behaviour."

"Well that may be true in here, but out there-" she began, brandishing the pen at Celia like it was an actual weapon.

"Have you been drawing cocks on their exams?" Frost interrupted. The Doctor dropped her pen.

"No! That was Nathan Cross – who is in your tutor group," she snapped, covering the penises with other sheets of paper. Celia glared at her. "Look, I just don't think I have the relative experience to deal with this incident."

"Get over yourself. We're all women, we've all had periods," Frost said, indifferent to the Doctor's struggle. Unfortunately, what Celia said was not true. The Doctor had not always been a woman and, subsequently – the Doctor had never had a period, not once. Reproduction didn't work that way on Gallifrey; and, personally, she always thought evolution had been a bit barbaric when it decided to make humans destroy and expel their own internal organs once a month. She had always felt the utmost sympathy for Clara.

"But I-"

"I don't care," Celia said finally, "You're pathetic. I'm in charge of you now, and if I say you have to deal with this, then you have to deal with this. I'm bringing them in."

"What? No! No, Celia – I'm begging you. I really don't understand how to – hi, girls," her tone immediately changed to one of bright politeness, as if she was pleased to see the two teenagers Celia shepherded into the room for her to speak to. Over the tops of their heads, Celia smiled at her evilly, and then slinked out of the classroom, shutting the door carefully behind her. The Doctor glared at the door, then sighed, and embarked upon a lecture that Clara was much better suited to: "Listen, girls, as a fellow, uh, woman… I understand that puberty can be a… complicated time. But, erm, you know, tampons – they're not toys. And from what I hear – that is, I mean, from what I know, myself, when I have to buy them, which I definitely do – they're pretty expensive."

"But Doctor, she-" Georgia, the shorter, more generally well-behaved one of the pair of them, began.

"Oh, I don't care what she did. Haven't either of you seen Carrie? The original, of course, not that godawful remake. The next girl you throw a tampon at might turn out to be a murderer with psychokinesis. Then who'd be laughing? Not you two. You'd be dead," she said. Then she thought that that maybe wasn't a good thing to say. "Plus, to reiterate my earlier point – they cost a lot of money! Imagine how much your mothers pay for them."

"They were school tampons, miss," Rita told her. Rita was the seasoned trouble-maker of them. To the Doctor's best understanding, something had happened between Georgia and her other friends that had led to Rita – that rogue – taking her under her wing. One day, the Doctor thought, Rita might be the head of some very successful small-time crime ring. She could have a whole gang of petty thieves at her fingertips; a bright future as a racketeer. Not that she'd ever tell her parents that on parents evening.

"They were what? Where'd you get that many school tampons from?" the Doctor asked. She didn't know a lot about the distribution of tampons in the school. As best she could tell, the girls' toilets all had machines in them, and if you desperately couldn't afford the machines, the office would gladly give you something to use. She had assumed they had brought their hoard of sanitary products in from home.

"From the vending machine, someone broke it," Rita said. The Doctor narrowed her eyes at this faux-innocence for a few seconds, then crossed her arms.

"Did you break the school tampon machine?" she asked seriously.

"No, miss!" Rita exclaimed, but she put a bit too much verve into her pretend-outrage. The Doctor raised an eyebrow, unimpressed by this attempt at deception.

"Okay, I know you're lying."

"Can't prove it. No CCTV in the girls' toilets," Rita said smugly, which was about as good as just admitting to it.

"She did break it miss, I saw her," Georgia said quickly. She wasn't quite as much of a rule-breaker as Rita would like, clearly, if she was grassing her up. The Doctor disagreed with that decision of hers; it would most certainly put her on Rita's bad-side if she were to get her into trouble, and Georgia couldn't really afford to go losing any more friends. "She used a screwdriver." Well now it was serious.

"A screwdriver!?" the Doctor exclaimed. Screwdrivers, in the hands of insolent, sixteen-year-old girls, would be a world of trouble for the school. The school, and whoever Rita decided to stab in the eyeball. Not that the Doctor would ever advise where it was best to stab someone, but the eyeball was a good target for a weapon like a screwdriver. Or inside the ear canal – but only if you had good aim.

"You're always telling us how useful screwdrivers are!" Rita now protested.

"Do you have a screwdriver on you now!?" the Doctor demanded, and she shrugged. The Doctor glared and held out her hand. "Give it to me. That's a weapon, you know. You're in a very genuine amount of trouble now, young lady." Begrudgingly, Rita fished the screwdriver (a pretty big one, too) out of her bag and handed it over. The metal shaft was slightly bent; probably because it had been used to force the tampon machine.

"You're only about ten years older than us…." Georgia muttered when she said 'young lady.' Oh, if only you knew, the Doctor thought to herself.

"You could give someone a lobotomy with this," the Doctor told Rita sternly. These words had the opposite effect than what the Doctor would have liked.

"Really?" she got excited.

"Not that you're going to get it back."

"You're stealing my personal property, miss," Rita accused.

"You've got some nerve trying to pull that."

"I thought Americans don't mind when kids bring weapons into school?"

"Alright, shut up now, that's not funny. Just because I have this accent doesn't mean I support gun crime. I'm sure most people in America really hate the idea of getting shot. Both of you have detentions every night next week – but Rita, I'm going to talk over with your other form tutor what your punishment for bringing this screwdriver into school should be," the Doctor said.

"You mean Mrs Oswald?" Rita asked.

"Yes, obviously."

"Your wife?"

"Yes, my wife."

"Why can't you think of a punishment yourself, miss?"

"Because I have a real issue with punishing people far more than they need to be," she said darkly, trying to possibly scare them a little. It didn't work.

"Do you ever punish Clara, miss?" she asked, doing her 'innocent' thing again. God, she was conniving. Supply teachers often fell for this act. Then someone would be called in to tell them no, Rita did not have diabetes, so there was no need for her to be sitting eating an entire box of forty-two Ferrero Rochers in the back of her Chemistry lesson.

"It's two weeks' detention just for that! Get out now, the both of you," she ordered them, going red, "And don't call her 'Clara'! It's Mrs Oswald to the lot of you. You'll learn it because she's going to be calling both your parents this week."

"You told them I'd do what?"

"Call their parents," Thirteen finished her story an hour or so later, the same day, while she and Clara wandered back out to their car carrying books for marking. The car was still that Ferrari of Adam Mitchell's they had been borrowing for quite some time now. Thirteen thought he must have forgotten they even had it, not that he ever really needed his cars. And he favoured his Porsche, when he did drive somewhere. The Ferrari was just a bit too flashy. That was why it had been keyed a couple of times by the school kids, and why someone had thrown a brick at it and left a nasty dent in the bumper. "Honestly, it was a nightmare. You're gonna help me out with punishing them though, aren't you, Coo?"

"I suppose so, since I'm the head of department now."

"I was thinking more because you're their other form tutor. You're the head of the English department. Throwing tampons around isn't anything to do with English," Thirteen said, leaving Clara put-out as they reached the car. "I don't know what to do – she did bring an improvised weapon into school."

"We'll think of something later tonight," Clara assured her, meaning, Clara would think of something later tonight, and the Doctor would nod approvingly. Clara opened the boot of the Ferrari and put their books inside, while the Doctor went and climbed into the passenger seat, since she still wasn't allowed to drive anything that wasn't the TARDIS. Which was a real bummer, in all honesty. "Do you know," Clara began when she got into the driver's side, "I'm also the youngest head of department in this whole school?"

"You're in your seventies," the Doctor pointed out, leaning on the door.

"Yeah – well – Moore doesn't know that. I'm just that incredible. She loves my mock exams initiative."

"Nobody else does," she muttered as Clara found the key and started the car. The engine purred loudly.

"Do you not like Lorna?" Clara asked as she put the car into reverse.

"I don't know – I think she's trying too hard trying to be the kids' friend. She doesn't command any authority." Clara burst out laughing. "What?"

"You hypocrite!"

"Okay, yeah, I also try to be their friend, and that's why I don't command any authority. Hence me needing to get you to help punish those kids. It's pathetic, god – here I am, the Oncoming Storm, and I can't even get some teenage girl to see that bringing a screwdriver into a lesson and throwing tampons around the canteen is wrong," she grumbled, "It's grating on me. I wish I was the bad cop."

"No you don't," Clara said, "Most of those kids think I'm way too strict."

"You are. When I married a woman who sometimes eats mayonnaise out of the jar with her fingers as a snack, I never suspected she had the potential to be such a dictator."

"Is that a compliment? Because I genuinely can't tell."

"As long as you don't start bossing me around…"

"I boss you around all the time, you just don't notice because I bat my eyelash and bring out the dimples," Clara said. Thirteen scowled. It was probably true.

"I just think that maybe promoting Celia might be what's best for the school."

"You hate Celia! Celia Frost is more suited to being an important member of the SS, not an important member of a teaching faculty," Clara told her, "You shouldn't be so quick to write Moore off."

"I guess. As long as she's not another alien disguising herself and trying to kill me, I don't think she can be that bad." There were a few moments of quiet while Clara navigated a tricky roundabout they had to take to get home, and then she swore.

"Shit!"

"What?"

"I forgot my bloody phone, didn't I?" she complained, "Urgh. That's the last thing I need. We're gonna have to go back."

"I'm not complaining," the Doctor shrugged. It would only add an extra ten minutes to their journey home, and they didn't actually have to be at any appointments. Nothing to be late to. And why would she complain about spending time with Clara? She wouldn't. Ever since how terrible things had been before her excursion to the past some months ago, she'd learnt to never take Clara's company for granted.

And maybe, if Clara had noticed her phone was missing just a little further down the road, the Doctor's estimate of an 'extra ten minutes' would have held true. Clara turned into a cul-de-sac so that she could turn around, swinging the Ferrari into the midst of an idyllic, village street (quaint areas like this was one of the reasons they lived in a town rather than a city.) And that was when it became clear that they were not getting home any time soon.

If the Doctor had had any kind of device capable of sensing temporal disturbances with her, this could have been avoided. But it wasn't, and it was always hard to detect rifts in space-time when you were inside a car with an incredibly beautiful woman sitting next to you (the struggles of marriage.) The Ferrari moved towards a row of houses and then, out of nowhere, lurched. It lurched forwards of its own accord, like Clara had just slammed down the accelerator for no reason whatsoever. And the whole car was pulled faster and then tore a window in reality itself. There was a blinding flash of light, heat all over, a noise like a sonic boom, one or both of them screamed at the surprise. In the brief moment in which they were nowhere, an impossible vacuum battered apart the car and forced itself onto them so that for a split-second the Doctor felt like her head was going to explode.

And then they were spat out at probably twenty miles an hour, which wasn't so fast until they realised they were heading straight for a dirty brick wall that hadn't been there five seconds ago. Clara hit the brakes but the car didn't respond at all, it just kept going down a decline until they were slammed straight into a building. The engine died, smoke rose up from beneath the bonnet, and the Doctor's seatbelt had tightened into a chokehold around her neck. She undid it quickly so that she could breathe.

"What the hell was that!?" Clara demanded of her, like she'd done something.

"Why're you asking me!?"

"What do you mean – why am I asking you!? Because you're the Doctor!" Clara said, trying to open her door. It didn't open easily, though. It was only when she forced her whole weight onto it with her shoulder that it crashed open and she fell out with it, right onto the thing, which had just broken all the way off the body of the Ferrari. The Doctor didn't want to try her own door, and so clambered out after Clara to try and help her to her feet. The car was battered and scorched, wholly destroyed in a matter of seconds.

"We went through a rift," she said, holding Clara's arms to steady her. And then holding them for a few more seconds after she was steadied, until dropping them to reach into her own coat pockets and find her sonic screwdriver. Clara stood gawking at the wreckage of the car.

"Me apples!" somebody yelled as the Doctor fumbled with the sonic. There was some guy just standing there, staring at the car, and the wooden wreckage of a fruit stand beneath it. A whole bunch of apples had been crushed under the burning wheels. Now the air smelt of hot apples and burning rubber, which was very unpleasant. "That's me 'ole liveli'ood!"

"Clear this area," the Doctor ordered him, "There's a tear in the fabric of, um… there's no point explaining it. Stand back."

"Who the bleedin' hell do you think you are!?" She ignored him. They weren't exactly in a secluded spot; it was a street. They'd just appeared out of thin air and run over a fruit stall. It was lucky no-one had been hurt. The Doctor scanned the air with the sonic screwdriver, but she didn't pick up any significant traces of temporal energy with it.

"Well?" Clara asked her.

"It closed behind us."

"Can't you open it?"

"No, I don't have any equipment with me," she said, "And the car's destroyed. Where are we?" The fruit seller was still shouting about their destruction of his wares. Clara began to wander off through the square they had crashed into; judging by the smell, they were at some docks, but the Doctor didn't have time to look around with this so-and-so wailing in her ear.

While the fruit vendor ranted and Clara meandered away from Thirteen's immediate vicinity and range of attention, Thirteen herself took her sonic screwdriver and went to try and pop open the hood of their smouldering car. When she managed it, smoke billowed into her face, making her cough heavily. She waved her hand around to try and clear the smoke and then leant in towards the engine, sonicking to try and detect what, precisely, was the matter. Their Ferrari suddenly looked like a heap of rusty junk, but there was always the possibility that she might get it to drive again, even though the wheels were melting into the apple-mush on the cobbles. Sonicking it did not go well. The gas pump exploded, and she went staggering back, at which point the fruit vendor and the few other people who had been observing what must be a very strange sight screamed and scattered. They shouted something about a 'devil machine' as they fled, and she watched them vanish until the whole area was emptied. It looked like a market, a dockside market.

"Damn thing…" she grumbled, fidgeting with the inner-workings of the car. Did she know a lot about cars? Not really. But if she could fix a TARDIS, she figured she could definitely fix a car. It didn't look too complicated, it was just sort of… destroyed. The whole engine would need to be stripped and replaced.

"I'm pretty sure I've figured out where we are," Clara's voiced called. The Doctor looked up and saw her returning from whence she had disappeared. There was another bang from inside the car, and a thin stream of smoke spiralled up out of the bonnet. "Leave that alone, would you? Come on." Clara beckoned her to follow, holding out her hand, which the Doctor took out of reflex. Clara pulled her through the small market area, and she saw that these docks were not the docks by the sea. They were at the edge of a river. A very large and easily-identifiable river, and it was so easily-identifiable because, on the opposite bank and quite a way upstream past flocks of boats and barges, the smoggy outline of Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament swam into view through the pollution.

"Urgh," Thirteen grunted, "Why is it always London?"

AN: Chapter 1011, "Bad Education," according to the traffic graphs I sometimes check to see that anyone's actually still reading this, always has way more views and visitors than any other chapter. So I was wondering, why is that? Are you guys re-reading it? If you guys ARE re-reading it, then please tell me what you think is so darned great. If it's anything to do with Clarteen I can always incorporate this mystery factor into this current storyline.