***I do not own Doctor Who, only Ester.***
Chapter 22 ***School Reunion***
I walked into the already full classroom and to the front of the room, putting my bag down on my desk chair and picking up a green dry-erase marker from it's holder. The class was surprising quiet as I wrote 'Shakespeare' across the board, underlining it once before turning to my class.
"Good morning class, today we will be taking some notes on one of the most popular playwrights in history." I said, talking to the class of board looking thirteen year olds. "Now, has anyone read any Shakespeare? Seen any of his plays?" No response. "Well then, more to learn, I suppose." I said with a smile. "Can anyone tell me what sort of plays he wrote in his time?" I asked the class. A girl with short, curly red hair rose her hand. "Yes, uhm..."
"Ash." She responded. "He wrote comedies, histories and tragedies." She recited.
"Very good." I nodded, writing those three on the board. "Now Shakespeare also wrote short poems called, anyone?" I asked. Only Ash rose her hand. "Anyone new?" No response other than Ashely. "Ash?"
"Sonnets."
"Do you know how many sonnets he wrote?"
"154"
"How many plays?"
"38 known ones."
"Date of death?"
"April 23 1616."
"Number of children?"
"Three"
"Names?"
"Susanna, Hamnet and Judith."
"What's Helena's monologue in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act 1 Scene 1 starting at 188?" I asked, knowing fully well there would be no way this girl could recite it.
"Call you me fair? That fair again unsay. Demetrius loves your fair: O happy fair! Your eyes are lode-stars; and your tongue's sweet air more tuneable than lark to shepherd's ear, when wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear. Sickness is catching: O, were favor so, your's would I catch, fair Hermia, ere I go; my ear should catch your voice, my eye your eye, my tongue should catch your tongue's sweet melody. Were the world mine, Demetrius being bated, the rest I'd leave to you to be translated. O teach me how you look, and with what art you sway the motion of Demetrius' heart." She recited word for word.
Needless to say, I was floored.
***
A few hours later, I found myself in the lunch line with the Doctor behind me. A portion of chips was places onto my tray along with a fruit cup and finished with a scoop of some sort of mash given to me by Rose on the other side of the sneeze guard. Rose shot me and the Doctor a death glare before the two of us walked to find a table to sit at and eat.
"Two days." Rose said, coming to our table dressed in her lunch lady get up to wipe our table with her rag.
"Sorry, could you just? There's a bit of gravy. No, no, just, just there." I said, pointing my fork at a spot, taking full advantage of the situation. Rose shot me a glare and I could feel the Doctor laughing at my side.
"Two days, we've been here." Rose complained.
"Blame your boyfriend." The Doctor said. "He's the one who put us onto this. And he was right. Boy in class this morning, got a knowledge way beyond planet Earth."
"Really?" I asked him. "I had a girl like that in my first class. She could spew out entire Shakespeare monologues with just an act, scene and line number."
"You eating those chips?" Rose said, sitting with us and taking a chip off of my tray.
"Yeah, they're a bit different." The Doctor said. I nodded in agreement
"I think they're gorgeous. Wish I had school dinners like this." Rose said, eating some more of my fries. I responded by eating some of the Doctor's. He gave me a look and I shot him a smile.
"It's very well behaved, this place." I said.
"Mmm."
"I thought there'd be happy slapping hoodies. Happy slapping hoodies with ASBOs. Happy slapping hoodies with ASBOs and ringtones." The Doctor rambled, bringing a grin to my face. "Huh? Huh? Oh, yeah. Don't tell me I don't fit in."
"You fit in just fine." I said with a laugh as I took in another of his fries.
"You are not permitted to leave your station during a sitting." The head lunch lady told Rose.
"I was just talking to these teachers." Rose said, standing up from her seat.
"Hello." Me and Doctor said, giving the lady a wave and a smile.
"He doesn't like the chips." Rose said, pointing at the Doctor.
"The menu has been specifically designed by the headmaster to improve concentration and performance. Now, get back to work." The lady said, walking away from our table.
"See? This is me. Dinner lady." Rose sighed, showing off her uniform as she walked away form us.
"I'll have the crumble." The Doctor called, causing me to laugh.
"I'm so going to kill the two of you." She said as she walked away from us and back to her station.
***
"Yesterday, I had a twelve year old girl give me the exact height of the Walls of Troy in cubits." Parson, a history teacher, told me and the Doctor as we sat in the staff room with some other teachers.
"And, it's ever since the new headmaster arrived?" I asked him.
"Finch arrived three months ago. Next day, half the staff got flu. Finch replaced them with that lot, except for the teacher you replaced, and that was just plain weird, her winning the lottery like that." Parson said, pointing to the Doctor.
"How's that weird?" He asked him, popping a crisp into his mouth.
"She never played. Said the ticket was posted through her door at midnight." He explained.
"Hmm. The world is very strange." The Doctor said, knowing fully well that we were the people that slipped the ticket under her door.
"Excuse me, colleagues." Headmaster Finch said when he walked into the room with a very familiar looking older woman that made my hearts stop in their track. A moment of your time. May I introduce Miss Sarah Jane Smith. Miss Smith is a journalist who's writing a profile about me for the Sunday Times. I thought it might be useful for her to get a view from the trenches, so to speak. Don't spare my blushes." Finch said, leaving soon after. Sarah Jane still in the room.
"Do you think it's really her? Our Sarah?" I asked the Doctor quietly. Both of us had stupid grins on our faces. He didn't get a chance to answer before Sarah Jane was making her way over to the two of us. She looked to be about 30 or 40 years older than when either of us had last saw her, but she was just as beautiful as she was when she was a young adult.
"Hello." She said, giving us a smile that warmed my hearts. I couldn't help but think of all the adventures the three of us had gone on in our time. The three of us were so young.
"Oh, I should think so." The Doctor said, not being able to take the grin off of his face.
"And, you are?" She asked us.
"Hm? Er, Johnson. Sally Johnson." I said, using the name the rest of the school knew me by. The Doctor, Rose and I didn't want to look like we were connected in any way; so that ruled off Ester Tyler and Ester Smith, so I just went to the name I would turn to back when I was still going by The Teacher. before I became Ester.
"John Smith." The Doctor told her.
"Sally Johnson, John Smith. I used to have friends who sometimes went by those names." Sarah said, no doubt thinking about my third regeneration and the Doctor's fourth; the ones she traveled with.
"Well, they're very common names." I reasoned.
"They were very uncommon people. Nice to meet you." She nodded, smiling at us.
"Nice to meet you."
"Yes, very nice. More than nice. Brilliant."
"Er, so, er, have either of you worked here long?" She asked us.
"No. Er, it's only my second day." We both said together.
"Oh, you're new, then. So, what do you think of the school? I mean, this new curriculum? So many children getting ill. Doesn't that strike you as odd?" She questioned.
"You don't sound like someone just doing a profile." I told her.
"Well, no harm in a little investigation while I'm here." She said.
"No. Good for you." The Doctor said. Sarah nodded at us before she moved away and on to the next teacher.
"Good for you. Oh, good for you, Sarah Jane Smith." The Doctor said, both of us grinning like maniacs.
"Our Sarah, look at our Sarah." I gushed.
***
"Oh, it's weird seeing school at night. It just feels wrong. When I was a kid, I used to think all the teachers slept in school." Rose said as her, Mickey, the Doctor and I walked through the dimly lit school that night.
"All right, team. Oh, I hate people who say team." The Doctor told me, scrunching his nose up. "Er, gang. Er, comrades." He tried.
"How about you stop while you're ahead dear." I offered, placing a hand on his arm.
"Right. Anyway, Rose, go to the kitchen. Get a sample of that oil. Mickey, the new staff are all Maths teachers. Go and check out the Maths department. Me and Ester are going to look in Finch's office. Be back here in ten minutes." The Doctor said, grabbing my hand and taking me down the hall way.
"You think she's in the school?"
"Oh, she's definitely in the school."
"I still can't believe it's actually her." I said, feeling like I could run a marathon. The Doctor looked down at me and pressed his lips to my forehead. "What was that for?" I asked with a smile.
"I'm happy." He told me, a grin on his face. "Plus, you're cute when you're excited." He said, making my face go red.
There was a bat-like screech form somewhere in the school and the Doctor and I both took out our sonics, scanning to see if there was anything around us.
"Let's go to the TARDIS and check." I said, and we started towards the corridor where our TARDIS was parked.
When we got to the corridor where it was parked, we saw that the door to the storage room was opened slightly, We went into the room to see Sarah Jane Smith standing in front of the TARDIS in pure shock.
"Hello, Sarah Jane." Me and the Doctor said together.
"It's you." She whispered in disbelief "Oh, Teacher. Doctor Oh, my God, it's you, isn't it. You've both regenerated."
"Yeah. Half a dozen times since we last met." The Doctor said.
"I've only done it once." I bragged, shooting her a grin.
"You've always been the more reasonable one, haven't you Teacher?" She said with a small laugh. That lit a spark in my chest, part of me missing the time when I was the Teacher. When we were younger, when we were just flying through time and space. When everything was so much simpler. Before I was Ester. "You look incredible." She told us.
"So do you." The Doctor told her.
"Huh. I got old. What are you doing here?" She asked us.
"Well, UFO sighting, school gets record results. We couldn't resist." I told her. "What about you?"
"The same." She said, taking a pause before getting what she needed to off of her chest. "I thought you'd died. I waited for you and you didn't come back, and I thought you both must have died." She cried, her eyes tearing up.
"We lived. Everyone else died." I said, pained.
"What do you mean?" She asked in disbelief.
"Everyone died, Sarah." The Doctor repeated. "I thought she died, until I found her here." The Doctor said, looking at me.
"What?" Sarah asked.
"My parent's wiped my memories, made me human." I told her. "They sent me to Earth where I lived for eight years as a human named Ester Tyler. Then the Doctor found me and everything went back to normal." I told her.
"I can't believe it's you." She said, looking at me and the Doctor just before there was a ear piercing scream. "Okay, now I can!" She said before the three of us started running to the place of the scream. Just like the good old days.
***
"Did you hear that?" Rose asked us when we met up with her. "Who's she?" Rose asked, looking at Sarah.
"Rose, Sarah Jane. Sarah Jane, Rose." I introduced, still grinning.
"Hi. Nice to meet you." Sarah said before turning to us. "You can tell you two are getting older. Your assistants are getting younger." Sarah said, smirking at us as we went looking for Mickey.
"I'm not their assistant." Rose protested.
"No? Get you, tigers." Sarah said, giving us a wink.
"Sarah!"
"Sorry!" Mickey said when we found him in a classroom surrounded by vacuum packed rats. "Sorry, it was only me. You told me to investigate, so I started looking through some of these cupboards and all of these fell on me."
"Oh, my God, they're rats. Dozens of rats. Vacuum packed rats." Rose said, looking grossed out.
"And you decided to scream." I asked Mickey.
"It took me by surprise!" He defended.
"Like a little girl?" The Doctor asked.
"It was dark! I was covered in rats!"
"Nine, maybe ten years old. I'm seeing pigtails, frilly skirt." I said, looking to the Doctor.
"Yeah, sounds about right." He agreed.
"Hello, can we focus? Does anyone notice anything strange about this? Rats in school?" Rose asked.
"Well, obviously they use them in Biology lessons. They dissect them. Or maybe you haven't reached that bit yet. How old are you?" Sarah asked Rose.
"Excuse me, no one dissects rats in school anymore. They haven't done that for years. Where are you from, the dark ages?" Rose asked her, obviously not liking Sarah.
"Anyway, moving on." I said, trying to break up the cat fight that was unfolding in front of us. "Everything started when Mister Finch arrived. We should go and check his office." I offered.
***
"I don't mean to be rude or anything, but who exactly are you?" Rose asked Sarah.
"Sarah Jane Smith. I used to travel with the Doctor and the Teacher." Sarah told Rose.
"Her name's Ester. Not the Teacher." Rose told Sarah.
"Uh, Sarah knew me when I was still the Teacher." I told Rose, getting a dirty look shot at me from my sister.
"Oh, if you want I could call you Ester." Sarah said awkwardly. "It's a pretty name, and it fits; meaning star and all."
"No, I don't mind, which ever you feel more comfortable with. Teacher, Ester, I don't care." I reassured my friend.
"Thank you." She smiled at me.
"Oh. Well, they've never mentioned you." Rose said smugly.
"Oh, we must've done. Sarah Jane. Mention her all the time." The Doctor tried, both of us knowing we would be in the dog house for this.
"Hold on. Sorry. Never." Rose said, walking a few steps ahead of us.
"What, not even once? They didn't mention me even once?" Sarah asked, outraged as she quickened her pace to catch up with Rose.
"Well this isn't good at all." I said quietly.
"Ho, ho, mate. The missus and the ex. Welcome to every man's worst nightmare." Mickey said, patting the Doctor on the shoulder.
"Hey, if anyone's the 'missus' it's me." I defended, grabbing on to the Doctor's arm.
***
"Maybe those rats were food." I thought aloud as I soniced the door to the Headmaster's office open.
"Food for what?" Rose asked.
"Rose, you know you used to think all the teachers slept in the school?" The Doctor asked as we looked at the ceiling to see a dozen or so giant bats hanging upside down, asleep. "Well, they do."
"No way!" Mickey exclaimed, running away, the rest of us following.
***
"I am not going back in there. No way." Mickey said once we were outside.
"Those were teachers." Rose said in disbelief.
"When Finch arrived, he brought with him seven new teachers, four dinner ladies and a nurse. Thirteen. Thirteen big bat people. Come on." The Doctor said, going back towards the school.
"Come on? You've got to be kidding!" Mickey said, not moving.
"We need the TARDIS. We've got to analyze that oil from the kitchen." I told him.
"I might be able to help you there. I've got something to show you." Sarah said, a grin on her face as she brought us to her car.
She opened the boot of her car to show: "K9!" Me and the Doctor exclaimed when we saw the metal dog.
"Rose Tyler, Mickey Smith, allow me to introduce K9. Well, K9 Mark Three to be precise." The Doctor explained as I went to pet K9.
"Why does he look so disco?" Rose asked, not very impressed.
"Oi! Listen, in the year five thousand, this was cutting edge." I told Rose. "What's happened to him?" I asked, seeing that he wasn't responding to anything.
"Oh, one day, he just, nothing." Sarah sighed, looking at her dog.
"Well, didn't you try and get him repaired?" The Doctor asked.
"Well, it's not like getting parts for a Mini Metro, beside, the technology inside him could rewrite human science. I couldn't show him to anyone." She explained.
"Ooh, what's the nasty lady done to you, eh?" The Doctor cooed to the dog as he pet him, causing me to laugh.
"Look, no offense, but could you three just stop petting for a minute? Never mind the tin dog. We're busy." Rose asked.
We closed the trunk and filed into Sarah's car, heading away from the school.
****
"I thought of you on Christmas Day." Sarah said when the three of us were working on K9 in a diner while Rose and Mickey were getting food across the diner. "This Christmas just gone? Great big spaceship overhead. I thought, oh yeah, bet they're up there." She told us.
"Right on top of it, yeah." The Doctor nodded.
"Really?" I asked. "That sounds great, can't wait to do it."
"You haven't done it yet?" The Doctor asked.
"No, not yet."
"I'm sorry?" Sarah asked.
"Oh, sorry, I don't travel linearly anymore, I come for an adventure with one version of him then go off and go to another version of him." I told her. "We wanted to mix things up a bit."
"So you've seen other regenerations of him?" Sarah asked.
"Yeah, it's pretty fun." I told her honestly.
"And Rose? Was she up there with you two?" Sarah asked the Doctor.
"She was there too."
"Did I do something wrong, because you never came back for me." Sarah asked, causing me and the Doctor to look up from K9. "You just dumped me."
"I told you. We were called back home and in those days humans weren't allowed." The Doctor said as I looked at her sadly.
"I waited for you. I missed you." She said.
"Oh, you didn't need us." I told her, trying to lighten the conversation. "You were getting on with your life."
"You were my life." She told us. "You know what the most difficult thing was? Coping with what happens next, or with what doesn't happen next. You took me to the furthest reaches of the galaxy, you showed me supernovas, intergalactic battles, and then you just dropped me back on Earth. How could anything compare to that?"
"All those things you saw, do you want us to apologize for that?" The Doctor asked.
"No, but we get a taste of that splendor and then we have to go back." She said.
"Look at you, you're investigating. You found that school. You're doing what we always did." I told her with a smile, taking Sarah's hand in mine.
"You could have come back."
"We couldn't."
"Why not?" She asked.
Neither me or the Doctor wanted to answer. To tell her that we got distracted. That we just kept going like we always did. That we just kept going straight ahead without looking back. She was smart, she probably knew this herself.
"It wasn't Croydon." Sarah said, breaking the silence that fell between the three of us. "Where you dropped me off, that wasn't Croydon."
"Where was it?" I asked her.
"Aberdeen."
"Right. That's next to Croydon, isn't it?" The Doctor asked. The three of us broke into laughter, the awkward tension finally dissolved. Some motion coming form K9 caught my eye.
"Oh, hey. Now we're in business." I said, smiling down at the robot dog that was now back in function.
"Mistress. Master." K9 greeted us, Rose and Mickey coming over to us.
"He recognizes us." I gushed, looking down at the little robot.
"Affirmative." He said, turning his ears.
"Rose, give us the oil." The Doctor told her.
"I wouldn't touch it, though. That dinner lady got all scorched." Rose said, handing him the vial of oil.
"I'm no dinner lady. And I don't often say that." The Doctor said, sticking a finger in the oil before smearing it on K9's sensor.
"Yeah, I wouldn't keep that line if I was you." I told the Doctor as we waited for K9 to process the oil.
"Here we go. Come on, boy. Here we go."
"Oil. Ex-ex-ex-extract. Ana-ana-analyzing." K9 stuttered.
"Listen to him, man. That's a voice." Mickey laughed.
"Careful. That's my dog." Sarah defended.
"Confirmation of analysis. Substance is Krillitane Oil." K9 said, causing me to let out a sigh and run a hand through my hair.
"They're Krillitanes." The Doctor said, just as nervous as me.
"Is that bad?" Rose asked.
"Very." I told her. "Think of how bad things could possibly be, and add another suitcase full of bad."
"And what are Krillitanes?" Sarah asked.
"They're a composite race." I explained. "Just like your culture is a mixture of traditions from all sorts of countries, people you've invaded or have been invaded by. You've got bits of Viking, bits of France, bits of whatever. The Krillitanes are the same. An amalgam of the races they've conquered. But they take physical aspects as well. They cherry pick the best bits from the people they destroy." I told them, rattling off my facts.
"That's why we didn't recognise them. The last time we saw Krillitanes, they looked just like us except they had really long necks." The Doctor added on.
"What're they doing here?" Rose asked.
"It's the children." I said grimly. "They're doing something to the children."
***
"How many of us have there been traveling with you?" Rose asked as we walked out of the diner to Sarah's car; Sarah, Mickey and K9 in front of us.
"Does it matter?" The Doctor asked her.
"Yeah, it does, if I'm just the latest in a long line." Rose told us.
"As opposed to what?" I asked her.
"I thought the three of us were... I obviously got it wrong. I've been to the year five billion, right, but this? Now this is really seeing the future. You two just leave us behind. Is that what you're going to do to me?"
"No. Not to you." I told Rose.
"But Sarah Jane? You were that close to her once, and now you never even mention her. Why not?"
"We don't age, Rose. We regenerate. But humans decay. You wither and you die. Imagine watching that happen to someone who you love." I said, my voice thickening. "You can spend the rest of your life with us, but we can't spend the rest of our's with you. We're both so old. He's 800 and something and I'm 500? 600? I'm so old I don't even remember how old I am!" I sighed.
"We have to live on." The Doctor continued. "Alone. That's the curse of the Time Lords." I grabbed his hand in mine, giving it a squeeze to remind him that I would be there with him.
All of a sudden, a giant bat flew down, swooping over us as we ducked to the ground.
"Was that a Krillitane?" Sarah asked after it flew away.
"But it didn't even touch any of us. It just flew off. What did it do that for?" Rose asked.
***
Since the TARDIS was still in the school, Sarah Jane let the four of us stay at her home. It was a very nice place, a little big for just one person, but nice none the less. Rose and Mickey each got a guest room, and the Doctor and I volunteered to sleep in the living room.
"Thank you again, for all of this." I told her as me and her sat in the living room as the Doctor made tea.
"Well it's not like I could have left you on the street!" Sarah laughed. "Besides, late night conversations and tea, it's just like old times."
"It is, isn't it." I agreed with her, sending her a warm smile.
"So what's new? A couple hundred years must be enough time for something interesting to happen." Sarah asked me. "Met anyone yet?"
"Of course I've met people! Each time you walk out of a building you meet someone-"
"You know that's not what I meant Teacher." She said, giving me the same grin that I've seen on both Amy and Rose's face.
"Oh. Oh!" I said, quickly decided that I wouldn't make this easy for my friend. "Yeah, I guess you could say I have." I told her, a smile on my face.
"Really? Who?" Sarah exclaimed, the same exact glint in her eyes that I've seen so many times before.
"My lips are sealed." I told her with a smirk.
"Is he an alien?"
"Yes, he's an alien." I laughed.
"Will you tell me his name?" She begged. I shook my head 'no' in response. "Fine, what's he like then?"
"Well." I started. "He's tall, and smart, and he's very good under pressure. He's heroic and kind and funny. And sometimes his fashion sense is just hilarious." I told her, thinking about my bow-tie wearing Doctor with a fond smile on my face. "He's a science geek, and he's very fond of his means of transportation." The Doctor came in to the living room, carrying three mugs of tea for us. "He's also the best at making tea." I said, taking my mug form his hands.
And that was when the penny dropped for Sarah.
"The two of you?" She questioned, a grin on her face and her eyes wide. "You're, you, really?" She asked not be able to fully process her thoughts.
"What's going on?" The Doctor asked as he sat down on the couch next to me, not understanding why Sarah was acting like she was.
"I just told Sarah about us." I told him, taking his hand in mine. Sarah was quiet for a moment. "Sarah?" I asked her. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine." She said smiling at us. "I"m so happy for you two." She wrapped her arms around the both of us, pulling us into a tight hug.
"Thanks." Me and the Doctor both said awkwardly as our faces went a little red.
"How long have you been together?" Sarah asked us once we had broken apart.
"Hard to say. A couple months for me?" I said, unsure of how long ago it has actually happened for me. Keeping track of dates and years and ages wasn't really something you did when you traveled to a different century ever other day.
"A few years for me." The Doctor said.
"The two of you just can't do things the easy way, can you?" Sarah asked us with a smile.
"Where's the fun in that?" The Doctor asked with a smirk, causing me to laugh a little.
"I suppose you're right."Sarah agreed.
We talked for another hour or two before Sarah left for her room, leaving me and the Doctor in the living room. Instead of the Doctor moving to the other couch like I had assumed he would, he simply laid down on the one we were sitting on, pulling me down with him so my back was pressed against his chest. He quickly pulled a blanket over us before wrapping his arms around my middle. All of his movements were so fluid, making me believe that this was something he was used to doing.
It was so easy to just melt into his arms and relax, my mind wanting to constantly stay in that state. Everything about it just felt so natural; the way my body seemed to fit so perfectly against his, the feeling of security that filled me when he tightened his arms around me, the warm feeling that ran its way through my body.
"This is nice." I said quietly, a smile on my face.
"Very." He agreed, placing a kiss on the top of my head. It wasn't long until I drifted off, falling into a deep sleep.
***
"Rose, Ester and Sarah, you go to the Maths room. Crack open those computers, I need to see the hardware inside." The Doctor said as we all stood in the front of the school as the students started filing into the building. "Do you have your sonic?" The Doctor asked me.
"Yeah." I said, taking my sonic out of my pocket to show him.
"Good. Mickey, surveillance. I want you outside." He told him.
"Just stand outside?" Mickey asked.
"Here, take these you can keep K9 company." Sarah told him, tossing him her car keys.
"Don't forget to leave the window open a crack." The Doctor told Mickey.
"But he's metal!"
"He didn't mean for him." I told Mickey.
"What're you going to do?" Rose asked the Doctor.
"It's time I had a word with Mister Finch." He said. I wrapped my arms around him and he placed a kiss on my cheek. "Make sure they aren't at each other's throats." He whispered into my ear.
"I'll do my best." I told him, giving him a quick kiss before running off after Rose and Sarah.
***
"Here." I told Sarah, giving her my sonic once we had gotten into the class room with all of the computers. "Try breaking into the main computer; I'll try re-wiring the router." I told her before we started on the tasks at hand.
"It's not working." Sarah groaned after some time had passed.
"Give it to me." Rose said.
"Used to work first time in my day." Sarah said once she gave it to Rose. I was messing with some wires, not actually doing anything at all, but using this as an opportunity to try to get the girls closer together.
"Well, things were a lot simpler back then." Rose told Sarah.
"Rose, can I give you a bit of advice?" Sarah asked.
"I've got a feeling you're about to."
"I know how intense a relationship with the Doctor and Ester can be, and I don't want you to feel I'm intruding-"
"I don't feel threatened by you, if that's what you mean." Rose said as she kept working.
"Right. Good. Because I'm not interested in picking up where we left off."
"No? With the big sad eyes and the robot dog? What else were you doing last night?" Rose asked Sarah.
"I was just saying how hard it was adjusting to life back on Earth."
"The thing is, when you three met they'd only just got rid of rationing. No wonder all that space stuff was a bit too much for you." Rose said, making me think my plan to get them closer might not have worked out so well.
"I had no problem with space stuff. I saw things you wouldn't believe." Sarah countered.
"Try me."
"Rose, Sarah-" I said, standing up as I tried prevent any fighting between the two.
"Mummies."
"I've met ghosts."
"Robots. Lots of robots."
"Slitheen, in Downing Street."
"Daleks!"
"Met the Emperor."
"Woah, wait. What?" I asked, but my questioned went unanswered.
"Anti-matter monsters."
"Gas masked zombies."
"Real living dinosaurs."
"Real living werewolf." Okay, now I wasn't sure if Rose was making this up or not.
"The Loch Ness Monster!" Sarah yelled, causing Rose to look a little dumbfounded.
"Seriously?" Rose asked. "Listen to us. It's like me and my mate Shireen. The only time we fell out was over a man, and we're arguing over the Doctor and Ester." Rose laughed along with Sarah.
"Oh, you're laughing. That's good right? Laughter means friendship?" I asked, going closer to the girls.
"I believe it dose." Sarah laughed, Rose nodded in agreement, causing a smile to spread on my face.
"Great!"
"Oh!" Rose said, realizing something that she wanted to ask Sarah. "With you, did the Doctor do that thing where he'd explain something at like, ninety miles per hour, and you'd go, what? and he'd look at you like you'd just dribbled on your shirt?" Rose asked, still laughing as I snorted, knowing exactly what face she was talking about.
"All the time! Does he still stroke bits of the TARDIS?" Sarah asked Rose.
"Yeah! Yeah, he does. I'm like, do you two want to be alone? Sometimes it's almost as if he's the TARDIS's boyfriend instead of Ester's!" Rose laughed. I laughed along too; knowing I was equally guilty of doing the same with the TARDIS myself, but not wanting to admit it to them. The door to the room opened to show the Doctor and the girls broke into another fit of laughter.
"How's it going?" The Doctor asked when he came into the room. The girls kept laughing and I made my way across the room to him.
"Pretty good, I'd say." I told him with a smile as the two kept laughing behind me.
"Why are you laughing?" The Doctor asked them, a look of confusion on him face. "What? Listen, I need to find out what's programmed inside these-" the girls got to a point of hysteria and the Doctor was utterly confused. "What? Stop it!" He whined. I just went up on my tip toes and placed a kiss on his nose, letting the girls laugh as much as they needed to.
***
"All pupils to class immediately. And would all members of staff congregate in the staff room." Came ringing through the school building a half hour later when we had actually gotten to working on the central CPU that help the code.
"No, no. This classroom's out of bounds. You've all got to go to the South Hall. Off you go. South Hall!" Rose said, turning students away from entering the class room as me and the Doctor were messing with the wires of the CPU; the Doctor sporting some of those wires around his neck and shoulders.
"I can't shift it." I groaned after my sonic had not been able to get us into the CPU.
"I thought the sonic screwdriver could open anything!" Sarah said.
"Anything except a deadlock seal. There's got to be something inside here. What're they teaching those kids?" The Doctor asked. Sarah typed something into the computer and brought up the symbol filler code on all of the computer monitors.
"You wanted the programme? There it is." She said, motioning to the screens.
"Some sort of code." I said, trying to depict it until it all of a sudden started it solve itself. "No. No, that can't be."
"The Skasis Paradigm." The Doctor said, looking at the monitor as well. "They're trying to crack the Skasis Paradigm."
"The Skasis what?" Sarah asked.
"The God maker." I explained, not taking my eyes off of the screen. "The universal theory. Crack that equation and you've got control of the building blocks of the universe. Time and space and matter, yours to control."
"What, and the kids are like a giant computer?" Rose asked.
"Yes. And their learning power is being accelerated by the oil. That oil from the kitchens, it works as a, as a conducting agent. Makes the kids cleverer." The Doctor explained.
"But that oil's on the chips. I've been eating them." Rose told us.
"What's fifty nine times thirty five?" I asked her.
"Two thousand and sixty five." Rose answered almost instantaneously. "Oh, my God."
"But why use children? Can't they use adults?" Sarah asked.
"No, it's got to be children. The God maker needs imagination to crack it. They're not just using the children's brains to break the code, they're using their souls." I told her just before the door to the class room opened and Headmaster Finch walked in.
"Let the lesson begin." He said, walking towards me and the Doctor. "Think of it, Doctor, Ester. With the Paradigm solved, reality becomes clay in our hands. We can shape the universe and improve it." He temped.
"Oh yeah? The whole of creation with the face of Mister Finch? Call me old fashioned, but I like things as they are." I told him with a smirk.
"You act like such a radical, and yet all you want to do is preserve the old order? Think of the changes that could be made if this power was used for good." Finch said.
"What, by someone like you?" The Doctor asked him.
"No, someone like the two of you." He told us. "The Paradigm gives us power, but you could give us wisdom. Become Gods at my side. Imagine what you could do. Think of the civilisations you could save. Perganon, Assinta. Your own people, Time Lords, standing tall. The Time Lords reborn." He tempted us, like waving a fresh piece of meet in front of a starving dog.
"Teacher, Doctor, don't listen to him." Sarah said, her voice sounding miles away. Me and the Doctor just stared Finch. I could help get rid of all of that guilt the Doctor carried. I could lose my own guilt caused by leaving him. We could live normally again, with our friends and family. We wouldn't be alone.
"And you could be with them throughout eternity." Finch said to Sarah and Rose. "Young, fresh, never wither, never age, never die. Their lives are so fleeting. So many goodbyes. How lonely you must be, Doctor, Ester. Join us." Whatever fate that faced Rose could be prevented. I could save my sister.
"We could save everyone." We said together.
"Yes."
"I could stop the war."
"They wouldn't die."
"No." Sarah said, trying to break us out of our deep thoughts. "The universe has to move forward. Pain and loss, they define us as much as happiness or love. Whether it's a world, or a relationship, everything has its time. And everything ends." Sarah said.
There was silence for a moment until the Doctor took control of the entire situation. He threw a chair at the main computer screen, smashing it to bits. "Out!" He yelled, taking my hand and running to the stair cases. Rose and Sarah ran after us as Finch let out a screech, summoning the other bat like creatures. We met with Mickey and Kenny, one of the students, at the bottom of the stairs.
"What is going on?" Mickey said, only to get pulled along by Rose as the Krillitanes continued to chase us. We ran to the lunch hall, trying to find somewhere to hide.
Finch walked in, followed by the bats.
"Are they my teachers?" Kenny asked the Doctor.
"Yeah. Sorry." The Doctor said quickly.
"We need the Doctor and Ester alive. As for the others? You can feast." Finch said before the bats started swooping down on us. We all ducked under the tables that filled the room, the Doctor not letting go of my hand. From under the table I saw a laser shoot at one of the bats, sending it to the ground.
"K9!" Sarah exclaimed, happy to see the metal dog as we crawled out from under the tables.
"Suggest you engage running mode, mistress." K9 told Sarah.
"Come on!" The Doctor said, getting everyone running as me and him stayed with K9z
"K9, hold them back!" I told him as me and the Doctor ran out of the room.
"Affirmative, Mistress. Maximum defense mode." I heard him say as we left the lunch room for the Physics class the Doctor had been teaching in these past few days.
***
"It's the oil." I thought aloud once the Doctor had sealed us all in the Physics classroom. "Krillitane life forms can't handle the oil. That's it!" I exclaimed. "They've changed their physiology so often, even their own oil is toxic to them. How much was there in the kitchens?" I asked Rose.
"Barrels of it." Rose said over the noise of the Krillitanes battering against the doors to the classroom.
"Okay, we need to get to the kitchens." The Doctor said before turning to Mickey. "Mickey."
"What now, hold the coats?" Mickey asked bitterly.
"Get all the children unplugged and out of the school. Now then, bats, bats, bats. How do we fight bats?" The Doctor rambled. Kenny looked at all of us before hitting the fire alarm with his elbow, shattering the glass and setting out the loud, high pitch alarm. The students started evacuating the school as we head towards the kitchens.
***
"They've been deadlock sealed." The Doctor said after he tried opening one of the barrels of Krillitane oil in the Kitchen with his sonic. "Finch must've done that. I can't open them." He sighed.
"Seriously? Who in there right mind deadlock seals a barrel?" I groaned.
"The vats would not withstand a direct hit from my laser, but my batteries are failing." K9 told us.
"Right." The Doctor said. "Everyone out the back door. K9 and Ester, stay with me."
***
Together, the Doctor and I were able to line up several of the barrels of oil for K9 to shoot.
"Capacity for only one shot, Mistress, Master. For maximum impact, I must be stationed directly beside the vat." K9 said, making my hearts grow heavy.
"But you'll be trapped inside." I told him.
"That is correct." K9 agreed.
"We can't let you do that." The Doctor said, looking just as pained as I was feeling.
"No alternative possible, Mistress, Master." K9 told us, making my hearts feel like two cement blocks in my chest.
"Goodbye, old friend." The Doctor told K9, grabbing my hand in his.
"I'll never forget you." I told the little dog, giving him the same sad smile the Doctor had on his face.
"Goodbye, Master. Goodbye, Mistress." K9 said.
"You good dog." Me and the Doctor said together before leaving him.
"Affirmative."
We left the kitchen to the outside of the school, me sealing the doors shut with my sonic before the inevitable happened.
"Where's K9?" Sarah asked, coming to us.
"We need to run." The Doctor said, not giving her an answer as he took her hand and started running along side me, away from the building.
"Where is he? What have you done!" Sarah yelled as she was taken away from the building.
The school blew up with a bang and paper rained down on all of the students in standing in the parking lot.
"Yes!" Kenny cheered near us.
"Did you have something to do with it?" A girl asked Kenny.
"Yeah, I did." He responded proudly.
"Oh my God. Kenny blew up the school! It was Kenny!" The girl yelled to her classmates.
"Yay! Kenny! Kenny! Kenny! Kenny!" The children chanted, but I could only think of what we had lost inside that school building.
"I'm sorry." The Doctor said, seeing Sarah's distressed stature.
"It's all right. He was just a daft metal dog. It's fine, really." Sarah said, trying to keep her emotions in check before finally bursting out into tears. I pulled her into a tight hug, letting her cry into my shoulder as I did to her, letting my own emotions finally get the better of me.
***
"Cup of tea?" I asked Sarah outside the TARDIS in a park by her home. She accepted and walked into the TARDIS with me. It was her first time seeing the TARDIS since she had left it all those long years ago.
"You've redecorated." Sarah noted, looking around at the beautiful ship. Sure it wasn't as sleek or as elegant as the TARDIS that the Eleventh Doctor flew around in with Amy and Rory, but there was something special about this grunge looking ship that reflected the personality of the Ninth Doctor.
"Do you like it?" The Doctor asked.
"Oh, I, I do. Yeah. I preferred it as it was, but er, yeah. It'll do." Sarah said.
"I love it." Rose said with a grin from her spot on the jump seat.
"Hey, you what's forty seven times three hundred and sixty nine?" Sarah asked Rose with a grin.
"No idea. It's gone now. The oil's faded." Rose responded with a small laugh.
"But you're still clever. More than a match for them." Sarah told her, pointing at me and the Doctor.
"You and me both. Doctor? Ester?" Rose asked, pushing us to ask Sarah the question we had been wanting to ask her since we first saw her in that storage area.
"Er, we're about to head off, but you could come with us." The Doctor said as I stood next to him, giving Sarah a bright and hopeful smile.
"No." She sighed. "I can't do this anymore. Besides, I've got a much bigger adventure ahead. Time I stopped waiting for you and found a life of my own." She told us.
"Can I come?" Mickey asked, none of us sure what he meant. "No, not with you, I mean with you three. Because I'm not the tin dog, and I want to see what's out there." Mickey told us. The Doctor and I shared an uncertain look with each other.
"Oh, go on, Ester, Doctor." Sarah said with a smile. "Sarah Jane Smith, a Mickey Smith. You need a Smith on board." She smirked.
The Doctor looked my way again, as if he was asking if I was okay with this. I gave him a smile and a nod, thinking it would be good for Rose to have another human on board with her, even if it meant having to keep a constant watch on the two of them, making sure Mickey had his own room, far away from Rose's. She was my little sister, after all. Maybe I could put a little bell on his door...
"Okay then, we could do with a laugh." The Doctor answered for us, draping his arm over my shoulders.
"Rose, is that okay?" Mickey asked Rose.
"No, great. Why not?" Rose said in a weird tone. It was almost like she was trying to cover up her true feelings. I made a mental note to talk to her about it.
"Well, I'd better go." Sarah said, a sad smile on her face.
"We'll be outside." I told Sarah, taking the Doctor's hand and walking out with him, knowing we still had one last gift to put in place for Sarah.
She was out of the TARDIS a couple minutes later, right after we had place her present behind the TARDIS so she would be sure to see it once we had left.
"It's daft, but I haven't ever thanked you for that time." Sarah told us. "And like I said, I wouldn't have missed it for the world."
"Something to tell the grandkids." The Doctor smiled at her.
"Oh, I think it'll be someone else's grandkids now. Your's even." Sarah said.
"Right. Yes, sorry. We didn't get a chance to ask." I said, my eyes wide with realization. "You haven't? There hasn't been anyone? You know." I said awkwardly, feeling like a bad friend.
"I never quiet found the time to settle down too much. I didn't want to get tied down in case these two old friends of mine showed up." She said while keeping a smile on her face. "Good bye Doctor. Goodbye Ester."
"Sarah-"
"Oh, it's not goodbye."
"Do say it. Please. This time. Say it." She asked, wanting some type of closure.
"Goodbye, our Sarah Jane." Me and the Doctor said together, giving Sarah the biggest smiles we could muster.
I pulled her into a tight hug, my eyes tearing up as I did so. Once I had let her go, the Doctor, being as tall as he was, lifted her off her feet in one big hug. Once her feet were back on the ground, the Doctor and I walked back into the TARDIS, closing the doors behind us.
After the Doctor wiped a stray tear from my face and placed a kiss on my forehead, we flew off, sending the TARDIS into the Time Vortex and simultaneously giving Sarah Jane Smith her present; a fixed tin dog named K9.
***
This is seriously one of my favorite episodes and probably one of my favorite chapters to write!
Also, Annie opens in less than a month and Junior year itself is possibly more stressful than any other thing I've been involved with.
My life is fun.
Anyway, enough of Emma freaking out about her life!
I hope you liked this chapter and had a great week!
Until next week,
Love you lots,
~Emma<3