Explore The Stars (Doctor Who Fanfic)

Chapter 2

Anna walked into class and sat in her seat at the front. Physics was the only lesson in school that she moderately enjoyed. Her favourite module was the one with all the astronomy and stars. Learning about what they're made of, if there's possible life on any other planets...

Her daydream was interrupted when Joe ran into class late. It didn't matter much as Mr Mason still wasn't there. That was unusual, Mr. Mason was always on time, if not early, so he could start the lesson with one of his wacky stories.

"Where's Mazzo?" Joe panted, out of breath. He'd obviously just ran from the other side of the field. Mazzo was the student nickname for Mr. Mason. He knew about it, but made no comment on it. He must have liked it.

"Dunno." Anna replied. "Unlike him to be late. Must be ill or something."
Joe shrugged and sat down on the stool next to her, grateful for the absence of a teacher so that he wouldn't be yelled at for being late.

A few minutes passed and by that time the whole class were starting to look around and wonder where Mr. Mason was or whether we would get a supply teacher. Linda Haverd was about to go look for him when a tall man with brown, sticky-up hair and dark rectangular glasses walked briskly into the room. He was wearing a brown suit and dirty white converse.

"Hello class, I'm Mr. Smith and I'm afraid dear old 'Mazzo' can't make it today so I'm going to be covering your lesson." He announced with a wide grin on his face.

"Well, at least it might be more interesting." Joe muttered to Anna. She smiled at this. Her friend didn't seem to understand the joy in physics, he would always ask to copy her work. She let him of course.

"Well then, let's start with finding out what you know already. Which topic shall we start with?" The energetic Mr. Smith said while jumping up to sit on the teacher's desk at the front.
Anna was confused. They were supposed to be learning about radioactivity. Mr. Smith didn't even have any textbooks out, he was unlike any teacher she had ever had in her 11 years of schooling.

She hesitantly put her hand up and Mr. Smith's waiting face once again turned into a cheesy smile as he addressed me.

"Yes, you, what's your name?"

"Umm.. Anna sir."

"Well, 'umm Anna sir', what topic would you like to learn?"

She decided 'to hell with it.' She didn't care if they didn't do radioactivity. It was one of the more dull modules of the subject anyway.
"Could we do space sir? Like, stars and stuff?" There was a collected groan from the class.

"Not again!" She heard a voice pipe up from the back. "You've made Mazzo go over all that stars shit the past 3 months, nerd!" It was Chris Jones. The leader of the gang that would constantly pester Anna. She just slouched down in her stool at this comment and hid her face with her hair yet again. She hated this.

"Now now, if she wants to learn more about the stars then she can, and watch your language! What's your name?" Mr. Smith called.

"Chris Jones sir." He smirked.

"Well, Christopher-"

"It's CHRIS, sir."

"Christopher I am talking!" Mr. Smith said firmly, "it's rude to interrupt. Listen to me." Chris seemed to splutter as he was answered back to. No one answered back to Chris Jones. Not even the teachers. "What would you like to learn?"

He seemed to gain back his composure.
"What d'ya you mean sir? I don't wanna learn nothin'"

"Well then that's a double negative so you surely want to learn something."
Anna had to laugh at his wit. Chris was starting to argue back when Mr. Smith interrupted him.

"Listen, I guess you lot aren't gonna agree on what to learn so I'll let you do you own thing. Revise for exams and whatnot."
This surprised Anna. He seemed like a good teacher if he could get the class to listen. He didn't seem like the sort of man who would give up easily. Ah well. She decided to just doodle in the back of her physics book. It would pass the time.

-----

It came to the end of the lesson and Anna was packing up her stuff. She had doodled constellations and her imaginings of different galaxies in her book. Wondering about the other planets that could be out there, and what the wildlife, if there was any, would be like, what would the atmosphere be made of...
She wasn't in a lesson with Joe next. He had P.E. while she had history. She wasn't looking forward to it. She was about to walk out the door when Mr. Smith called her name.

"Anna?"

She stopped and looked back.
"Yes sir?"

"Are you really interested in the universe?"

"Well, it's where we live isn't it? It's interesting to understand the ways of life and to wonder if there may be other life out there on other planets and if it's intelligent life that we could communicate with and..." Anna realised that she was rambling. "Sorry, I got a little carried away.." She looked down at her shoes and scratched the back of her head in embarrassment.

"No, it's fine! Honestly. I'm interested in what you think." Mr. Smith was looking at her with a pleasant smile on his face.

"Well, ummm.... I gotta go to my next lesson..."

Mr. Smith seemed to come out of his own day dream and jumped up.
"Yes of course! But if you like, you can come by after school today and I can teach you some stuff that isn't included on the school syllabus?"

Anna was flustered at the offer. "Oh! Well, yeah! Sounds great."

"Brilliant! I'll see you then." He said with wave. She awkwardly waved back and ran to history. Dammit, she was gonna be late.

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A/N Hey, this was a long chapter. I hope you liked it! I'm worried that I haven't quite got the Doctor's character right. I'm trying to get through the story to the point where they're in the TARDIS. I think it'll be easier to portray his character then. Let me know in the comments how you found it and any improvements you might like in there.
Thanks!

-thepinkgremlin