The copy right of all things pertaining to the concept and characters of
Dr Who is the property of the BBC.  This story is a work of fan fiction;
it has been written simply for the pleasure it gave me in writing it; and
no money has or will change hands with respect to the story.


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Sandra let out a little groan.  Her hand closed reflexively on the note
she had found on the kitchen table, crushing it into a ball.  The few
words Sam had scribbled on the scrap of paper had gone through her heart
like a dagger.  In the awful stillness which followed the ending of her
world, the pouring rain sounded loud through the half open window.  Cars
swooshing along the wet street filled the flat with a sound like stretched
out heartbeats.

A scream of anguish burst suddenly from the girl.  Her hand shot out and
swept up the tea pot, their "special" tea pot, and hurled it with savage
force.  It went through the window with a lively crash.  Moments later,
the full pot exploded with a heavy thud in the basement well, amid the
jangling shards of glass from the window.

Sandra barely heard them.  She was already on her feet, wrenching open the
door and pounding down the short passage.  She slammed out of the front
door and took the six steps in two strides, her hand shooting out to grab
the gate post and swing her around onto the pavement.  Then she was away
through the rainy darkness, her bare feet slapping on the wet stones.

An angry cry from the basement tenant followed her up the street.  Sandra
didn't hear.  She was oblivious to everything, except the shock of Sam's
betrayal.

She fled up the street in momentary glimpses of jeans and tee shirt as she
raced through the cones of orange radiance cast by the street lamps, her
shoulder length ddark hair streaming.  At her side, the cars whooshing
past threw up showers of spray, which was turned to grey fog by their
lights.  At the end of the road, Sandra plunged right across the busy
cross street with no regard for traffic.  Brakes squealed, drivers shouted
and pounded on their horns; but Sandra was oblivious to the anger she had
inspired in them.

She dived into the dark of an alley between the brightly lit window of a
chip shop and the darkened premises of a building society.  She collided
with people emerging from the chip shop, crashing right through them,
bundling the people aside.  They shouted angrily at her as they stooped to
pick up the paper wrapped bundles from the wet pavement.

Uncaring of the mayhem, Sandra pounded up the alley and out across a quiet
street bordering a park.  She did not even hesitate at the railings, but
launched herself at the iron, heedless of the spikes topping the barrier.
She scrambled over and lunged at the flower scented dark beyond.  Landing
heavily, she stumbled through the flower beds, and across the path.  Her
foot caught in a "Keep Off The Grass" sign.  She went sprawling onto her
face.  Clutching in desperation at the wet grass, she screamed Sam's name.
The anguished cry was absorbed into the sodden night.

Sandra let her face fall into the grass.  She lay there sobbing, her tears
running away into the rain soaked ground.  The damp earth pressing against
her face brought her no relief from her torment.  In a sudden frenzy of
anguish, Sandra shoved herself up to continue her wild, pointless dash to
nowhere.

Over the noise of the rain, and her own gasping breath, she became aware
of another sound.  It was almost like the asthmatic wheezing of some
ancient organ.  Moments later, she ran headlong into a tall box.  Stunned
by the impact, she sat down hard on the wet grass.  She stared bemusedly
at the pulsing blue light on top, until startled by a voice from behind
her.

"Quite a tumble you took there, young lady.  I do hope you are not too
badly hurt?" The voice had just a hint of a Scottish lilt.

Sandra's head jerked around.  She saw a small man bending over her, his
face shadowed by a broad brimmed hat.  He was holding an umbrella over
them both.  He offered a hand to help her up.

"Come along, young lady, we wouldn't want you to catch your death of cold
sitting out here in this rain, now would we?"

Still stunned from her collision, she reached out to him almost without
thinking.  His powerful grip closed over her hand; and she was hauled
effortlessly to her feet.  Somehow, and she could never afterwards explain
exactly how it happened, she found herself cradled in his arms, sobbing
and sobbing as though her heart would break.

The man patted her back as he lilted soothing words at her in his engaging
brogue.  "There now, young lady.  There now.  no one's worth all this,
surely?"

"Sam's gone;" Sandra wailed, clutching at the little man.  She buried her
face in his jumper.  Gently, he placed a hand on the back of her neck.
The skin of his palm was unexpectedly cool.  Sandra found it oddly
soothing.

"Yes, I know," the stranger admitted sadly; "but things will get better.
I promise you, things will get better.  There are happier times coming."
He began a quiet song; it was something uninteligible about "barrooms" or
something, repeated over and over, which had a calming effect on her
tumbling emotions.

For a while after that, her recollection of what was going on became
somewhat hazy.  She remembered struggling to disentangle herself from
muddy clothes with hands which were slow to obey.  She recalled standing
under a hot rain fascinated by the swirling pattern of muddy water as it
sank into a dark opening between her feet.  There were impressions of a
fragrant white fluffiness and of her left arm sliding into cool blue silk.

Some time later, she came to herself lying on a gently yielding mattress
under a light coverlet of a gentle russet colour.  She was wearing blue
silk pyjamas.  Above her was a featureless white ceiling, and all around
was a low humming at the edge of audibility.  It was a very comforting
sound.  Buried deep within its heart was a feminine voice, singing a
gentle lullaby.

Slowly, Sandra sat up and looked around.  The dimensions and shape of the
chamber were unclear in the dim, source less light.  She pushed off the
coverlet and slid her legs off the bed.  The floor felt cool under her
bare feet.  In response to her movement, the sourceless light brightened,
causing Sandra to catch her breath in alarm.

The room came more clearly into view.  It was large, and encompassed
within white walls, decorated in an intriguing pattern of round
indentations.  The only furniture was an antique looking vanity and an
overstuffed armchair.  Folded and stacked neatly on the seat of the chair
were her clothes.

Sandra got up and stood for a long moment staring around the bare room,
before moving to the door.  On opening it she heard a familiar sound.
It's cheerful familiarity was profoundly unsettling in these strange
surroundings.  She stepped into a corridor similarly roundelled, and
followed the sound along the slightly curving corridor to another door.
She gripped the handle.  At that exact moment, the noise stopped.

Sandra pushed open the door and steppe through.  The room beyond was
large, round with a hexagonal console of some kind in the exact centre.
Across the Centre she could see what looked like a set of double doors.

"Tea?"

Sandra started violently.  Her perplexed gaze flicked to her right.
There, the little man she remembered from the rain was sitting forward in
a wing arm chair.  Before him was a small table with tea things.  He was
holding up a cup towards her with a welcoming smile.  He tapped the spoon
with which he had been stirring the tea.  It made a sharp tink, tink.

"Tea?" Sandra asked, bemused.  She looked all around the room, then back
to the smiling little man.  "What is this place?"

Before he could answer, the double doors swung inwards; and a girl's voice
called out: "Couldn't get cod, Prof.  So I got plaice instead."

Sandra turned to see a young woman paused before the closing doors.  She
was clutching a paper wrapped bundle.  She was wearing jeans and a bomber
jacket which was glistening wetly.  Her shoulder length hair was brown.

Their eyes met.

The Doctor, who had been sitting forward in the chair studying the two
girls' reactions with ferocious intensity, relaxed back into the cushions.
He smiled a little secret smile.

Sometimes, it was very useful to be a Time Lord.  One could be in exactly
the right place at exactly the right time to help his friends.  He had
been aware for a long time of Ace's "difficulties" with boys.  He saw it
in her body language, sensed it in the aggression thus displayed, in her
sudden introspective silences and moodiness that came upon her from time
to time.  And, wondering what might be done, did it.

Of course, for Terrans, the Doctor knew, there was no such thing as "love
at first sight" despite what many romantics would have one believe.
Though the realisation might strike like a thunderbolt, seemingly out of
the blue, true love developed slowly over time.  It was indisputably a
sweet mixing of shared experiences, mutual dreams and shared emotions.

No, there was know such thing for Terrans; but there was chemistry; and
the Doctor knew a lot about chemistry...  And predictable outcomes.  For
instance, if you mixed sodium an water you got a strong reaction...

The Doctor settled back in the lounger to observe the explosion.


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The End