Adventures in Time and Space (TARDIS Family Adventures: Part 2)

1: Lessons in Tomatoes

"Donna!!"

The redhead sighed and set her book down in her lap upon hearing her name shouted for a second time, all the way down the TARDIS hallway and into the library where she sat sipping a cup of tea. Scarlett sat opposite her in the other armchair, doing the same. The two of them were enjoying some peace and quiet, each reading a book, chatting a bit in between pages when something came to mind. It was their respite while the Time Twins tinkered about on the ship. She thought it was bad before the ship had 'redecorated,' as the Doctor called it, but now that there were all sorts of new shiny parts to admire, the two of them were even worse than before.

"Oi! I'm coming Spaceman, you don't have to shout!" Donna yelled back.

Scarlett snickered, setting her book down in her own lap a moment to question the other Time Lady. "How can you tell the two of them apart when they yell like that?"

Donna shrugged. "Well, part of it just comes from all the experience I had with the Doctor before Jacob even existed. Part of it is the pitch, usually the Doctor goes up on the last syllable and Jacob goes down. And, Jacob tends to nudge me mentally along with the shouting. So I get it in stereo, mentally and verbally."

Scarlett shook her head with a smirk as she casually stated, "You'd think by now he'd have started speaking telepathically with everyone."

Donna stared at her a moment, the thought having never occurred to her. "You know, now that you mention it—"

"Since we all telepathically linked back on Teni to exchange information, you should be able to link with him with relative ease," Scarlett explained to Donna and sat up.

Donna's tongue ran across the front of her teeth a moment as she nodded. "I can do better than that." She tilted her head to the side, a habit she gained when she first started learning how to communicate telepathically. A moment later she grinned when another shout came down the hall.

"Ow! Earthgirl! I felt that!" the Doctor shouted.

Scarlett laughed, "What did you do?"

Donna grinned. "A little telepathic whammy I picked up by accident when Jacob and I were having a minor argument the other day. He said it was the equivalent of getting a smack on the arm. Guess I better go see what he needs. And have a little talk with him about the need for shouting, or lack thereof."

Scarlett watched Donna walk out, then thought about their conversation. It had been several months since the Time Lords left Earth behind and went traveling. They had visited a few of the Doctor's favorite spots and did some shopping at Donna's request. There were a few mishaps and adventures along the way, like when Donna accidentally got them arrested because she talked to a maidservant who was following behind her mistress. Or when they had been witness to a flying vehicle accident on another planet and just barely managed to save the passengers before both vehicles blew up.

In all that time, she had forgotten about their earlier idea to work to further strengthen their telepathic and telekinesis skills. She hopped up out of her seat and took her book back to her quarters, a plan forming in her mind as she walked, she began communicating with the TARDIS her needs for a training room.

-*-*-

Two hours later, Donna, the Doctor, and Jacob found their way through the TARDIS to a room they had never been in before.

"I don't even know what this room is." The Doctor frowned as he looked at the door in front of him. "I don't think it's existed before today. Scarlett must have had her create it."

Before the other two could ask their own questions, the door slid open without a touch by any of them. "I hope you are prepared to get messy." They heard Scarlett's voice from the other side of the door and with a shrug from Jacob, they stepped in.

The room was relatively bare. Plain white walls lined the whole room, and a white table sat in the middle. The Doctor and Jacob's left eyebrows both went up simultaneously when they saw a pile of tomatoes in the middle of the table.

"Scarlett, I don't want to seem insensitive here, but—have you gone completely bonkers?" Donna questioned in her own sassy, yet genuine way.

Scarlett crossed her arms in front of her as she stood opposite the table from them. "It's time for training to begin. I've neglected my promise to begin training you all to expand on the natural telepathic and telekinetic abilities that come with being a Time Lord or Teni."

"Tomatoes?" the Doctor questioned as he picked one of the fruit off the table and looked at it.

"Yes, tomatoes. Feel free to each pick one up and verify they are real. This will be the last time you touch them with your hands. From here on out we begin practicing your telekinetic skills—with tomatoes. They're relatively soft, and if they accidentally, say, hit someone—" She smirked and with a barely perceptible swipe of her finger a tomato flew up off the table and landed with a "smack" in the middle of the Doctor's chest. "—then no harm done."

The Doctor's jaw dropped as he looked between his now soiled shirt and suit jacket and Scarlett. "I believe there is harm to my suit!" He hefted the tomato that was already in his hand as if he was considering throwing it.

"Ah, ah! No throwing. No using your hands. When you can pick the tomato up and throw it at me using your mind, I'm fair game. And if it makes you feel better—" She quickly nodded her head to the side and two tomatoes flew off the table and smacked right onto Donna and Jacob.

"I'm not quite sure this is fair!" Jacob announced with shock.

"Consider it motivation." She grinned.

Donna looked down, and considered for a moment that in 'normal' circumstances she would have been livid to have had a tomato thrown at her, leaving a red stain across her shirt. But since when was anything bloody normal on the TARDIS. So, instead of getting upset, she just laughed.

"You? You don't have a problem with this?" Jacob looked at Donna in alarm, pointing to her shirt.

"Oh, come on Timeboy, the TARDIS cleans up the clothing quite nice. The stains will go away." She then snickered. "Besides, you did start the food fight last week in the kitchen."

"Alright then," Scarlett began her instruction. "first step-levitation. Before you can gain skill at moving an object, or in this case, launching it, you need to be able to simply lift it up off the table..."

-*-*-

The Doctor had been the first to pick up on the skill. Which made sense, seeing as he had been a Time Lord longer than any of the rest of them. It was more a brushing up on unused skills than a learning of all new ones.

Donna was the next, which aggravated Jacob to no end, but eventually, he had a tomato hanging in mid air like the rest of them. It had been an hour, and the floor and table were getting rather messy from the pulp and juice of dropped tomatoes.

"Alright, I'd say that's enough mess for today. You all are making fantastic progress." Scarlett smiled and clapped her hands together, clasping them in front of her.

"No, wait, wait. It seems to me, if I just—" The Doctor lifted the last tomato off the table, his hand hanging in mid air, then his face scrunched as he concentrated and flicked his wrist. The tomato whizzed right past Scarlett, who stood with her hands crossed over her chest and left eyebrow raised, and landed with a splat against the wall. He growled and grimaced, "Almost! I almost got you!"

"Almost, yes, but not quite." Scarlett shook her head and smiled as she moved from the spot she had occupied the entire lesson.

The Doctor got a mischievous look on his face as she passed close to him. He reached out and grabbed her wrist, quickly pulling her towards him and into an embrace, effectively smearing the tomato from his front onto hers. He landed a quick peck on her lips before speaking through his grin, "There now, much better."

Donna and Jacob burst out laughing behind them. Scarlett shook her head and bit her bottom lip a moment before she leaned over towards the table and grabbed a handful of tomato pulp and rubbed it into his hair. "Oh, look at that, is that a new hair product you're trying, Doctor?"

-*-*-