Child of Time: A Doctor Who Fanfiction

The Impossible Satellite

        Chelsea wandered down the spiral staircase and along the rustling coats, jackets, hats, scarves, and shoes from every time and place in the universe. She hadn't entirely convinced herself that she wasn't dreaming or hallucinating, but at any rate, she wasn't about to go around in her pajamas, dream or not. 

        "Two lefts, one right, and a left again." he'd said. 

        "Just pick anything?" she asked, frowning. "Is there really more rooms to this?" 

        "Oh, yes," he shrugged, "Rooms and rooms. Just, don't get lost, it's down that way--and don't touch anything important-looking!" he called after her. "Like big red buttons! And if you find the swimming pool, tell it to get back to the library!" 

        Chelsea, who had fortunately found her way to the TARDIS'es closet without injury or mishap,  now fingered a Victorian-looking dress, a navy coat with red lining, and a long scarf, coughing at the dust. Who knew there was dust on spaceships?

        The racks and racks of adornments of every type spiraled down around the stairs, and there was a whole section just for shoes (a great number of Converse, she noted). In the end, the silence of the place bothered her and she snagged jeans that looked about her size, a white shirt, and a black sweater to go over it. It didn't feel right, just taking some so-called alien's clothes that he kept in his so-called closet in his so-called spaceship, but she tried not to think about the enormous wrongness of the place and instead focus on what a lovely dream it was; she wouldn't get sacked for her dreadful report here. 

        She changed in a smaller cupboard, pleased to find it had a lock, though it seemed backwards to put a lock on a closet. The whole place was backwards, she decided.         

        Fascinating. 

        Rooms and rooms, he'd said. She trotted up the steps and stuck her head out into the hallway. The temptation of wandering through the place was difficult to resist--say it was real. Say he really was an alien. Surely she was passing up the chance of a lifetime to explore a real life spaceship? Chelsea stood there for a moment, and then shrugged and concentrated on finding her way back. She decided that a real life spaceship would be modeled differently, and he certainly wouldn't let her wander around in it. 

        She'd wrapped up her pajamas in her coat, not quite sure what to do with them, and stood there with her coat in hand and watched 'the Doctor' tinker around in the console room. 

        "Hello again!" he said, his voice muffled. "Find the swimming pool?" 

        "No, but I have a question." 

       "Oh, I'm so sorry, they're very hard to get rid of. You might have to see someone about that. Now!" He slid out from under the control panels, what appeared to be a screwdriver in his hand, and hopped to his feet. "To Satellite five!" 

        She was about to protest his igoring her question, but she was so startled, she stopped. "Satellite five?"

        "That's the place! Coming?" 

        Chelsea stared at him, and then looked once at the door, and then back at him, a thousand questions at her lips. "You mean, we haven't left yet?" 

        He laughed, pulling a face. "Humans! Thinking space-travels all sleek and silent! This is the real thing," he said, and pulled a lever. 

        That wheezing, groaning noise returned, the whole ship jerked violently, sending Chelsea almost back out into the infinite hallways. The cylinder above the hexagonal control center slid up and down with every wheeze of the ship, and she felt a rush of excitement, almost--not quite, but almost--beginning to believe it was real. Surely she, opposed to anything alien or not strictly proven by fact, wouldn't be able to dream up something like this?