Doctor Who

Sandquake

An unfinished 7th Doctor story involving the mysteries of the Bermuda Triangle, the Sand Sleepers from the Pleiades star cluster, and Ace's father.

"I didn't know the TARDIS flew at night," Ace cooed, admiring the central column of pulsing cyan.

"She doesn't," an indignant reply came, "as it isn't night."

Ace kept her eyes on the gentle bobbing of the cyan time rota as it continued its dance in the room's ashen dim. She knew she need only inspect the TARDIS console room before her guardian, the one known as the Doctor, would seek her out. It didn't matter if it was day or night. It didn't even matter if it technically wasn't night, apparently. In fact, she had to ask what that even meant.

"Honestly, professor, you don't half say some confusing things."

"To keep you on your toes. The other half of me wants to know why you're up so late," the Doctor smiled, stepping beside Ace in the rota's pulsing, cyan glow.

"But I thought you said..." Ace started, but stopped. She felt far too tired to think about what time it was, exactly, and convinced herself to start again. "I couldn't sleep."

"That's the trrrrrrouble with a time machine, you never find the time to get into a decent sleeping rrrrrroutine," the Doctor sighed, rolling the r's of his word, as he often did when confronted by a problem which had yet to be overcome.

Ace smiled. She rather liked the Doctor's quirks, and the fact that she didn't know much about him. All she knew was that she was safe in his hands... and he in hers.

"Okay," Ace smiled, turning to face the Doctor with renewed vigour, "if it isn't night, then we've got to be in some kind of temporal orbit."

"Temporal orbit?" the Doctor asked, taking his panorama hat off to scratch the head somewhere beneath his matted black hair.  "Now look who's not making sense."

"I'm making perfect sense! It's when something, like the TARDIS, is parked at one specific point in time, but is still on the move. Like... a satellite locked in orbit around Earth. Except with us, it's in time" Ace grinned, thinking that maybe her tired state was good for inspirational thinking, after all.

"Very good, Ace, I'll have to remember that term for the future," the Doctor wooed, impressed.

Suddenly, the lights flared up and the room was abuzz. Ace shielded her eyes from the harsh light, her eyes having adjusted to the night glow of before. She heard the Doctor bound up to the central console, where the time rota bobbed, and he soon set about flicking switches and whatever else lay on the mish-mash of controls.

Ace lowered her arm away from her eyes, her padded jacket crinkling from her movement. Having found herself unable to rest, she had thrown on her usual 1980's jacket adorn with various sewn patches of her interests, and set off to the TARDIS console room. She often found the gentle carousel of the time rota soothing, but recently nothing had helped her sleep any easier.

"Insomnia is a dreadful parasite. It feeds off the mind and prevents us from sleep. What you need is an adventure, Ace. Something to exhaust your mind and body until you're rrrrready for bed."

"The last time I slept, I dreamt my dad was being covered by darkness, suffocating... I don't think I'll ever be ready for bed, professor."

"Doctor," the Doctor corrected, but Ace knew he was also found of her own quirks as she was with his, "and I thought you didn't know your father?"

"I like to think he has this young face, despite being an old geezer, and with a muddy brown jacket, and dark eyes and fights for what he believes in, despite being a smaller guy that everyone picks on, and... and... and a bit like you, really, professor..." Ace trailed off.

"Yes, I suppose."

The honeycomb walls of the TARDIS room rattled as the wheezing brakes whisked them to plains anew. Ace loved this part of their travels - anywhere in space and time was just a wheezing sound away before popping out the doors and into an adventure! Ace grabbed her backpack. She couldn't wait.

"I see you've got your jacket on," the Doctor mused.

"I never leave without it," Ace replied and walked arm in arm with the Doctor, out of the TARDIS doors.

Ace's nostrils were immediately invaded by the salty air. A gull squawked somewhere overhead and the lapping waves of the briny blue barraged the ship beneath their feet. A swift wind swept Ace's hair into the sky, before caressing her neck with its chilly fingers. There was no mistaking it, they were on a ship in the middle of the ocean.