Travels With a Timelord ~Doctor Who fan fiction~

Chapter Three: A Better Life

As soon as my eyelids flashed open, I jumped up, my breath catching in the back of my throat as I almost lost my balance. I looked around my surroundings furiously, realising I wasn't at home.

In fact, I wasn't sure where I was, as I found myself inside an orange room, the walls panelled with metal, the floor being hard and bumpy metal. In the centre there was what looked like a control pad with a cylindrical tube linking up to the controls. It looked so mismatched, like a mechanic had just patched bits and bobs together to make a model, but at the same time it was so sleek and elegant in an endearing way, the wear and tear of it showing it was clearly loved. There was also something about it that made me note that it was out of this world, something that couldn't possibly be from Earth. Whatever this room was, it was as alien as the thing that had attacked me.

Upon my thoughts drifting to the creature, I gasped, looking down at my shoulder, only to notice I was now out of my blazer and my shirt was torn away where my arm was, where the wound was wrapped in a small white bandage. Frowning, I curiously prodded the fabric of the bandage, wondering who would have fixed me up, until the memories came back.

That man... the Doctor.

"I brought you into the TARDIS after you passed out, how you feeling now?" I heard a voice call from behind me, and when I spun around, I was greeted by the sight of the Doctor. As our eyes met, I realised I must have looked terrified, as his face twisted up into another grin. "It's alright, you're safe, if Rose could trust me I'm sure you can manage it too,"

I nodded slowly, still taking my surroundings in. It was all so bizarre, so unlike any other situation I'd ever been in. Part of me thought that maybe I was still dreaming, but another part of me found myself hoping that none of it was a dream, that it was all real.

"What'd you do? How long have I been out? Shit, Jay and Karrie are gonna kill me, I should have been home hours ago!" I spoke too quickly, my mind suddenly grasping everything that had gone on.

"It's alright, trust me," he spoke gently again, his face turning serious as he moved closer to me. His face seemed so calm, so collected and safe that I instantly began to trust him. "I used some anti-venom then bandaged you up. The rest of your stuff is over by the console. You were passed out for about an hour, do you want me to give you a ride home?"

I looked around me once more, breaking the eye contact between me and the Doctor. I wandered over to the console, looking closer at the switches and buttons, the knobs and dials, running my hand over some of them carefully, my mind trying to understand all of the sights around me.

"Is this what this is then? Some sort of pimped out bus where you pick up people who've been assaulted by aliens, fix them up then drop them home?" I asked, the whole idea sounding crazy, though it made him laugh and nod.

"Pretty much, yeah, you got me," he laughed.

"Seriously though, what is this place?" I frowned, curiosity getting the better of me. "And who are you exactly?"

"Like I said, I'm the Doctor, no one really, just a traveller, and 'this place', as you call it, is my TARDIS," he began to explain, a certain sense of authority in his tone. "T-A-R-D-I-S, stands for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space. It's a spaceship of some sort. I can travel to the past, future, different planets, different galaxies, and sometimes different dimensions if we get the ship on a good day, all in time to be back home for chips. Is that alright?"

I wasn't entirely sure how to react. It was a lot of information, a lot of information that seemed so radical and ridiculous but yet I seemed to just instantly accept it. I wasn't entirely sure why I believed him, but I did, and I found myself laughing. Laughing from shock, from happiness, from insanity.