The Defender of Time

Sixteen

January 26

Early in the morning, Oliver woke Alessia up when he decided he was hungry. Or, perhaps he was thirsty, or perhaps he wasn't feeling well. Alessia was too exhausted to find out what was wrong; she settled for pulling him close and planting a kiss on his head. An hour later, she was awoken again, this time from noises clattering from the outside of her door. She assumed the least and pulled the covers over her head. If it was something bad, somebody would wake her up.

About an hour later, she was awoken for the third and final time, this time by a figure sitting down onto her bed. "Good morning, Alessia," her father's voice whispered. "Wake up. Hurry."

Alessia groaned and curled her legs toward her chest. "Is it an emergency?" She slurred tiredly.

"Yes!" He whispered. "Get dressed and come to the kitchen. We need you."

She shot up in bed to look at the Doctor's face, but she only caught the trail of his coat hitting against her doorway. Rather habitually, she grabbed her glasses from her nightstand and rushed to get dressed, now assuming the worst. She clasped her overalls as she slid her feet into her boots (she forgot the socks, but she could deal with it), pulled her hair to the base of her neck, swung her backpack over her back (although she was almost certain it was empty), and pounded down the hallway.

When she arrived at the kitchen, it was pitch dark. Admittedly, she wasn't sure how to turn on the lights, so she instead settled for squinting in the blackness. "Dad?" She called. 'Why's it dark?"

Without warning, the lights flashed on, revealing the Doctor and Clara, smiling madly. "Happy birthday!" They yelled. The Doctor ran forward and grabbed Alessia around the middle, twirling her in a dizzying circle before hugging her to his chest. "Happy birthday!" He exclaimed, smiling broadly. "Did we surprise you?"

Alessia pulled her head away from her father's chest and blew away the hair that had fallen in front of her face. "You mostly just scared me."

"Close enough!" Laughed Clara, as she took Alessia from the Doctor and set her on the ground. "Happy birthday, sweetheart." Alessia beamed and hugged her around the neck.

The Doctor took his turn again to pick Alessia up off the ground. She was rather beginning to feel like a volleyball being passed back and forth. "See those presents on the table?" He asked, nodding to the small stack of differently sized boxes wrapped in bright cartoonish paper. When Alessia nodded, he said, "Those are all my presents. It's tradition. The birthday girl's dad gets her presents until she turns ten. And you arrived just in time! I get a year of presents!"

Alessia furrowed her eyebrows for a moment and looked him in the eyes. "I didn't get you any gifts," she said. "Was I supposed to?"

Clara sighed and pulled Alessia to her side (again). "Your father is just terrible at jokes. These are for you, Alessia. Not him. He doesn't get anything."

"Oh." Alessia peeked over her mother's shoulder to the stack of gifts, but was pulled back down.

"No peeking!" Clara insisted. She guided Alessia to the nearest kitchen chair and sat her down. "Is everyone here?" She turned in a circle as if counting a large group of people (there were three of them, four counting Oliver), and nodded her head curtly. "Alright. We can begin. Which one first?"

Alessia bit her bottom lip and pointed at the purple box closest to her, topped with a white ribbon and a small tag that told her the gift had come from Oliver. "How did Oliver give me a gift?"

"With a little help," said the Doctor. "We did the wrapping, he just told us what he wanted to get you."

Satisfied with the answer, she ripped open the paper to pull out what appeared to be a backpack, (because it was a backpack). "It's a new backpack!" She observed. She flattened it on the table in front of her, and it was then she noticed that there was an oblong clear window in the front of the canvas, which protruded oddly. "Oh," she said. "Why's it look like that?"