Doctor Who: Transmat

Chapter Three

Inside the TARDIS: chaos. With the sudden departure of the Doctor, the TARDIS had slowly spiralled out of control inside the time vortex. The whole console room was shuddering, the lights were flickering, and the central console threw sparks everywhere. Meanwhile, the time rotor was spinning at an un-normally fast speed. Horrible screeching and groaning noises filled the air. Clara was clinging to the monitor screen, trying without success to figure out what the spinning Gallifreyan symbols meant. In her panic, she had dropped the small device that the Doctor had given her; but she dare not let go of the console...

Captain Evington had retreated to his office in defeat while Smithy guided them towards the new planet. The Doctor stood over Smithy's seat, switching his gaze from him to the planet, whilst sharing various methods of piloting; most of which Smithy had never seen in the flight records. Smithy had also stood his ground whenever the Doctor had asked if he could pilot. Scott was sat to the left of Smithy, at his bank of monitors which shone the propulsion system diagnostics and main controls at him. To the right of Smithy, Sandy and Julia were sat watching their corresponding monitors. Dale was stood behind them all, leaning on the wall next to the door and keeping his eye on the Doctor. He didn't trust this Doctor character, and had so many questions about his sudden arrival. Where did he come from? How did he get here? And what was his name? He decided to listen in to their conversation.
     "No, no. The combustion immunity? They only installed that to make you feel better."
     "Yeah, right. So you're telling me, if I flip the engines to full, then off, and full again, they'll explode?" Smithy looked up at the Doctor.
     The Doctor returned his gaze with an unimpressed, but slightly curious, raise of an eyebrow. "Tell you what, give it a go. If the engines don't explode, I'll tell you about the day I dropped an apple on Isaac Newton from a tree." Smithy chuckled and looked down at his controls, but thought better than to actually try. He didn't want to be responsible for possibly jeopardising the mission. The Doctor stood up straight and looked back to the ever approaching planet.

After the request (and death glare that followed) from Sandy that the Doctor and Dale should leave the cockpit and find themselves seated, they had left, and found themselves seated. They were in the section of the shuttle behind the cockpit which housed the exit hatch and white environmental protection suits (a cross between the stereotypical space suit and a hazmat suit) decorated with various symbols, but the largest, located on left of the chest, was the NASA logo. The Doctor was looking around curiously while tapping his fingers together. Dale watched him, he still had questions, and he thought now as good a time as any, "Who are you?"
     The Doctor looked over to him quizzically, "Do you live in a dreamworld? You seem to be a bit dreamy."
     "Just answer the question, mate."
     "I'm the Doctor."
     "Doctor of what, exactly?"
     "Take your pick."
     "What's that supposed to mean?"
     "I'm sure you'll find out one day."
     "What does that-" Dale began, but was quickly interrupted.
     "Was that going to be a silly question?"
     "Um..I don't think-"
     "Never mind, what's more interesting is why you have a couple of seats next to the exit-hatch. What if it blew off during re-entry? Or in this this case first-entry. We'd be killed instantly, no doubt sucked out and dropped from the upper atmosphere to a most uncomfortable death. Although the fall could be enjoyable." The Doctor looked over to Dale and raised an eyebrow. He shivered.
     "Ain't you a cheery one."
     "I tried that. I cheered myself to sleep. Anyway I seem to have a knack for surviving impossible situations, so we should be fine." He gave Dale a wide, toothy grin. Dale looked away slowly, then strapped himself down with the safety belt attached to the wall behind his seat. If the belt was attached to the seat, and the hatch did blow off, then the seat would effectively become an ejector seat. The Doctor followed suit, doing up his own safety belt, after getting a little tangled in it to begin with.

Captain Evington leaned back in his chair and looked up at the ceiling. He was in his office, behind his desk, which looked to be a single sheet of white, lightweight metal. It appeared to rise straight from the floor, and then flow back down to it. On the desk, apart from the comm unit and monitor screen, there was a single photo in an old wooden frame. In the photo, sat a brunette who was smiling at the camera. Her arms were around a 7 year old girl that was sat on her lap, and appeared to be laughing - the caption underneath read, 'Alexandra and Katie'. There was a wooden box underneath the desk on which the Captain had rested his feet, the contents of which he had not shared with the crew. There was a bookcase against one wall, again made of (what seemed to be) a single piece of white metal, and ran up the length of the wall. Three of the shelves were full of books, all of which the Captain had read, and most were over 20 years old. However, there were a few from around the 20th Century. The rest of the shelves housed various trinkets that the Captain hadn't wanted to part with. He sighed and leant forwards, pressing the button on the comm unit.

Dale reluctantly watched the Doctor as he fiddled with a thing with another thing. The first thing that the Doctor had fished out of his pockets resembled a small walkie-talkie; he had tried turning it on - to no avail - and that was when he produced the second thing, which he had used to take off the back of the small device. It was a strange piece of technology, but then again, Dale wasn't a whizz kid with technology anyway; unless it fired something out of a barrel.
     Then, without warning, a voice droned in Dale's ear. "Send the Doctor to my office."
     Dale pressed a button on his earpiece and responded, "Right-o, Sir." He coughed, "Cap'n wants you in his office."
     The Doctor pressed the walkie-talkie back together. He didn't look up, "What for?"
     "I dunno."
     "Doesn't tell you much does he?" He pocketed the two strange things, untied himself from the chair then stood up, "Also, why on Earth does he have an office? Surely that's a highly inefficient waste of space?"
     "NASA wanted him to Captain the vessel, he wanted an office. He gets his way."
     The Doctor wore a stern look, "Does he really? Interesting. I'm beginning to understand why he doesn't like me." He turned and left, opening every door he came to. Dale leant his head back on the padded head-rest. He was thinking. After two years they had finally reached their destination, so why was this old bloke here? It was logically impossible that he could be here at all. But logic was Julia's field of work, so he need not worry too much. At that he closed his eyes, and waited for sleep.