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The Doctor Is In
A Thursday Prompt story
© 2010-2020 by Walter Reimer
Prompt: “Find a story you haven’t finished – and finish it.”
(Set in the Spontoon Islands universe. The Fourth Doctor and Tegan Jovanka are © The Beeb Beeb Ceeb.)
The sighing of the breeze and the rustling of palm fronds under a tropic afternoon sun was eclipsed by a soft groaning, wheezing sound that grew louder and louder as an object slowly materialized on the Casino Island sidewalk. None of the late-afternoon passers-by noted its arrival, as the object contained an SEP field, and as a result any questions concerning its sudden appearance simply became Someone Else’s Problem.
The sound died away, the light flashing on top of the object dimming. The object was a police call box, used by the public to summon the Constabulary, and it was a virtual twin of the call box on the opposite corner. Only a virtual twin, though, for while the standard call box was a variety of ‘tropic’ colors – pastel orange and green for the benefit of tourists who expected to see such things – the mysterious object was a somber, official-looking dark blue.
The right-paw door of the box opened and a head poked out. The fur stepped out and squinted up at the sun, revealing himself to be a Bedlington terrier with an expansive and unruly mop of curly brown headfur. His clothes were completely unsuited for the weather, consisting of a tweed suit with a sweater vest, a baggy brown overcoat and a striped scarf that, if unwrapped to its full length, could have easily measured twenty feet. “Tegan,” he said in a pleasant British accent, “are you sure this is Australia?”
“Should be, Doctor,” a younger kangaroo wearing a blue QANTAS stewardess’ uniform said as she stepped out of the box. Her English was marked by a flatter Australian accent. She too looked up at the sun, then looked around and remarked, “Nice day, nonetheless . . .“ Her voice trailed off as two felines walked past her, arm in arm.
She blinked first at them, then at the Doctor, and finally at herself.
“What the hell is this?”
Noticing the change for the first time, the Doctor studied his own paws. “Must be a different dimension,” he remarked. “I have to say, though, I like the look.” He glanced over at Tegan, who was twisting around and making outraged sounds at the sight of the thick tail that trailed behind her. “Tegan, what on Earth are you doing? Stop that, or you’ll go all dizzy.”
Tegan stopped and glared at the Doctor. “In case you haven’t noticed, Doctor, but I’m a kangaroo.”
“Well, you are Australian,” he pointed out reasonably. “You could as easily have been a wombat, you know.” He shrugged. “I must remember to recalibrate the dimensional stabilizers.”
“But where are we?” Tegan demanded, her nose twitching as she looked around.
“Hard to tell,” the Doctor replied, “but it looks like evolution here followed several different paths, instead of the one on Earth – well, your Earth at least.” He stepped away from the police box and wandered over to a newsstand, coming away with a newspaper. The vendor had at first boggled at the two silver Roman denarii he had been given, but as the silver was genuine (according to the bite test) he didn’t raise a fuss.
“We’re on Earth,” the Doctor said as he pointed to a map on an inside page. “Continents are about the same, but a lot more islands. Speaking of which, we’re about five thousand miles from Australia,” and he gave a mockingly accusatory glance at Tegan. “Are you certain you programmed things correctly?”
“Everything but the conceptual geometer,” Tegan said. “You did that.”
“I did?” The terrier’s brows furrowed and he gave her the newspaper. “You must have jostled my elbow. Well, then, come along and let’s look around,” he said suddenly, and started off down the road.
“Hang about a minute,” the Doctor said, abruptly doubling back to the TARDIS and causing Tegan to scramble out of his way before he trampled her. The terrier opened the door to the police box and stuck his right arm and head inside.
He looked around the control room and down at his paw – no, hand, he corrected himself. His right hand was again skin and nails. He patted his face; yes, there was his nose, exactly where it usually always had been.
He glanced back outside and saw a furry paw with short, well-trimmed claws. “Hmm.”
“What’s the matter, Doctor?” Tegan wasn’t panicking, but she did sound a little apprehensive.
“Apparently the TARDIS is carrying a bit of our dimension along with it,” the Doctor replied. “So you won’t have to worry about pouch hygiene when we get back to our Earth.”
“That’s a relief,” the kangaroo said. “I was starting to worry we’d be stuck like this – and my salary won’t cover regular flea dips.”
“You could always get one of those collars,” and he grinned at her to tell her he was only joking. Tegan, used to his sense of humor, merely rolled her eyes at him.
They set off down the street. “So, if we’re not in Australia,” Tegan said, “any idea where we are?”
“Some place called Spontoon,” the Doctor replied. “From the crowd, I’d say tourism is a major part of the economy.” His ears swiveled at the sound of engines and he looked skyward, shading his eyes with a paw. “Tegan?”
“Yes, Doctor?” the kangaroo looked up from the copy of the Spontoon Mirror in her paws.
“What’s the date on that newspaper?”
“Hm? Oh, um . . . “ Her ears swiveled as she looked up. “August twenty-eighth . . . 1938.” She added, “Apparently we’re here in the middle of the annual Schneider Cup air races.”
“That explains the airplane, then.” He lowered his paw and grinned at her. “If there’s a QANTAS office at the airport, you can get your job before you applied for it.”
She started laughing. “That might be complicated to explain,” she said, scanning the headlines. “Hm . . . the usual trouble in Europe, that’s normal . . . someone named Long is President of the USA . . . “
“Alternate realities,” the Doctor remarked absently. He was pausing every few steps to sniff the air, a broad and almost childishly happy expression on his face. Sometimes regeneration was a bit random, but this was something definitely new to him.
For someone about nine hundred years old, anything new was something to be treasured.
He described a winding path through the crowd of tourists, Tegan trailing along behind him, and as they walked past a sidewalk café the Doctor paused as a goat seated at a table snarled, “Dekára! Óchi, aftó den eínai sostó!” and threw a pencil at a notepad before him. The pencil bounced off the pad and flew through the air, landing at the Doctor’s feet.
Before the goat could get halfway out of his seat the terrier scooped the pencil up and walked over to his table. “I can understand your frustration, my dear fellow,” the Doctor said. “Pencils used to give me no end of trouble, too.” He grinned as he offered the pencil to the man.
The goat looked at the pencil sourly before saying in heavily-accented English, “Thank you, sir.”
“Oh, think nothing of it,” and the Doctor gave a shrug. “What has you so angry at an unfortunate pencil, hm?”
“Nothing that you would know of,” the goat said irritably. “It is a matter of the higher mathematics.”
“Higher mathematics!” the terrier said. “Might I have a look anyway? I’m the Doctor, by the way.” He stuck out a paw.
“Stavros Kypriakos,” the goat said, taking the paw briefly and shaking it once. He spurned the pad with a fingertip. “Here. It is a problem that has defied me for weeks now.”
“Hmm.” The Doctor glanced down at the pad and studied the ranks of equations on the paper as he sat down uninvited. Tegan stood by, splitting her attention between the Doctor and the passing crowd.
He held out his paw for the pencil, and Kypriakos gave it to him. The Doctor changed one symbol, added another, and passed the pad back to the goat. “Have a look at that.”
Kypriakos narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the terrier before glancing at the pad. He blinked and studied it again, his frown turning to a look of complete amazement. He slowly looked up at the Doctor, who grinned.
“You . . . you solved it . . . “
The Doctor shrugged. “You overlooked the variance in Equation Six. After that, everything fell into place - ”
Before he could react, the goat launched himself at the terrier, hugging him and bussing him on both cheeks before sitting back down, gazing raptly at the completed problem while the Doctor looked crossly at his companion. Tegan was almost doubled over laughing. “Doctor, I cannot thank you sufficiently!” Kypriakos said. “What are you a Doctor of?”
“Oh, well, this and that.”
“Well, nevertheless, you have been a Godsend, and I must reward you.” He started patting himself down and suddenly seemed to notice the kangaroo standing nearby. “And is this young woman with you, Doctor?”
“Yes, she is. We’re on our way back to Australia.”
“Ah! But first,” and the goat pulled two pieces of pasteboard from his suit pocket. “Here, please. They are, ah, grandstand passes for the races. General seating, but I must reward you somehow for your assistance.”
“Oh, well, really it was nothing – “
“Nothing! Nonsense,” Kypriakos declared. “No one must say that the greatest designer of aircraft the world has ever seen would fail to reward someone for their help. I insist.”
The Doctor debated whether to compare the man’s stubbornness with that of a four-footed goat from Earth, and almost immediately thought better of it. The terrier smiled broadly and took the tickets. “Thank you so much, Mister – “
“Doctor.”
“Doctor Kypriakos, yes. Thank you again. Come along, Tegan.” The Doctor stood up, nodded pleasantly to the goat, and rejoined his companion at the edge of the crowd.
“Well,” and he brandished the tickets, “we should have some time to wander around before we try to get the TARDIS out of this universe, so would you like to watch the air races?”
“That’d be fun,” Tegan replied.
end
A Thursday Prompt story
© 2010-2020 by Walter Reimer
Prompt: “Find a story you haven’t finished – and finish it.”
(Set in the Spontoon Islands universe. The Fourth Doctor and Tegan Jovanka are © The Beeb Beeb Ceeb.)
The sighing of the breeze and the rustling of palm fronds under a tropic afternoon sun was eclipsed by a soft groaning, wheezing sound that grew louder and louder as an object slowly materialized on the Casino Island sidewalk. None of the late-afternoon passers-by noted its arrival, as the object contained an SEP field, and as a result any questions concerning its sudden appearance simply became Someone Else’s Problem.
The sound died away, the light flashing on top of the object dimming. The object was a police call box, used by the public to summon the Constabulary, and it was a virtual twin of the call box on the opposite corner. Only a virtual twin, though, for while the standard call box was a variety of ‘tropic’ colors – pastel orange and green for the benefit of tourists who expected to see such things – the mysterious object was a somber, official-looking dark blue.
The right-paw door of the box opened and a head poked out. The fur stepped out and squinted up at the sun, revealing himself to be a Bedlington terrier with an expansive and unruly mop of curly brown headfur. His clothes were completely unsuited for the weather, consisting of a tweed suit with a sweater vest, a baggy brown overcoat and a striped scarf that, if unwrapped to its full length, could have easily measured twenty feet. “Tegan,” he said in a pleasant British accent, “are you sure this is Australia?”
“Should be, Doctor,” a younger kangaroo wearing a blue QANTAS stewardess’ uniform said as she stepped out of the box. Her English was marked by a flatter Australian accent. She too looked up at the sun, then looked around and remarked, “Nice day, nonetheless . . .“ Her voice trailed off as two felines walked past her, arm in arm.
She blinked first at them, then at the Doctor, and finally at herself.
“What the hell is this?”
Noticing the change for the first time, the Doctor studied his own paws. “Must be a different dimension,” he remarked. “I have to say, though, I like the look.” He glanced over at Tegan, who was twisting around and making outraged sounds at the sight of the thick tail that trailed behind her. “Tegan, what on Earth are you doing? Stop that, or you’ll go all dizzy.”
Tegan stopped and glared at the Doctor. “In case you haven’t noticed, Doctor, but I’m a kangaroo.”
“Well, you are Australian,” he pointed out reasonably. “You could as easily have been a wombat, you know.” He shrugged. “I must remember to recalibrate the dimensional stabilizers.”
“But where are we?” Tegan demanded, her nose twitching as she looked around.
“Hard to tell,” the Doctor replied, “but it looks like evolution here followed several different paths, instead of the one on Earth – well, your Earth at least.” He stepped away from the police box and wandered over to a newsstand, coming away with a newspaper. The vendor had at first boggled at the two silver Roman denarii he had been given, but as the silver was genuine (according to the bite test) he didn’t raise a fuss.
“We’re on Earth,” the Doctor said as he pointed to a map on an inside page. “Continents are about the same, but a lot more islands. Speaking of which, we’re about five thousand miles from Australia,” and he gave a mockingly accusatory glance at Tegan. “Are you certain you programmed things correctly?”
“Everything but the conceptual geometer,” Tegan said. “You did that.”
“I did?” The terrier’s brows furrowed and he gave her the newspaper. “You must have jostled my elbow. Well, then, come along and let’s look around,” he said suddenly, and started off down the road.
“Hang about a minute,” the Doctor said, abruptly doubling back to the TARDIS and causing Tegan to scramble out of his way before he trampled her. The terrier opened the door to the police box and stuck his right arm and head inside.
He looked around the control room and down at his paw – no, hand, he corrected himself. His right hand was again skin and nails. He patted his face; yes, there was his nose, exactly where it usually always had been.
He glanced back outside and saw a furry paw with short, well-trimmed claws. “Hmm.”
“What’s the matter, Doctor?” Tegan wasn’t panicking, but she did sound a little apprehensive.
“Apparently the TARDIS is carrying a bit of our dimension along with it,” the Doctor replied. “So you won’t have to worry about pouch hygiene when we get back to our Earth.”
“That’s a relief,” the kangaroo said. “I was starting to worry we’d be stuck like this – and my salary won’t cover regular flea dips.”
“You could always get one of those collars,” and he grinned at her to tell her he was only joking. Tegan, used to his sense of humor, merely rolled her eyes at him.
They set off down the street. “So, if we’re not in Australia,” Tegan said, “any idea where we are?”
“Some place called Spontoon,” the Doctor replied. “From the crowd, I’d say tourism is a major part of the economy.” His ears swiveled at the sound of engines and he looked skyward, shading his eyes with a paw. “Tegan?”
“Yes, Doctor?” the kangaroo looked up from the copy of the Spontoon Mirror in her paws.
“What’s the date on that newspaper?”
“Hm? Oh, um . . . “ Her ears swiveled as she looked up. “August twenty-eighth . . . 1938.” She added, “Apparently we’re here in the middle of the annual Schneider Cup air races.”
“That explains the airplane, then.” He lowered his paw and grinned at her. “If there’s a QANTAS office at the airport, you can get your job before you applied for it.”
She started laughing. “That might be complicated to explain,” she said, scanning the headlines. “Hm . . . the usual trouble in Europe, that’s normal . . . someone named Long is President of the USA . . . “
“Alternate realities,” the Doctor remarked absently. He was pausing every few steps to sniff the air, a broad and almost childishly happy expression on his face. Sometimes regeneration was a bit random, but this was something definitely new to him.
For someone about nine hundred years old, anything new was something to be treasured.
He described a winding path through the crowd of tourists, Tegan trailing along behind him, and as they walked past a sidewalk café the Doctor paused as a goat seated at a table snarled, “Dekára! Óchi, aftó den eínai sostó!” and threw a pencil at a notepad before him. The pencil bounced off the pad and flew through the air, landing at the Doctor’s feet.
Before the goat could get halfway out of his seat the terrier scooped the pencil up and walked over to his table. “I can understand your frustration, my dear fellow,” the Doctor said. “Pencils used to give me no end of trouble, too.” He grinned as he offered the pencil to the man.
The goat looked at the pencil sourly before saying in heavily-accented English, “Thank you, sir.”
“Oh, think nothing of it,” and the Doctor gave a shrug. “What has you so angry at an unfortunate pencil, hm?”
“Nothing that you would know of,” the goat said irritably. “It is a matter of the higher mathematics.”
“Higher mathematics!” the terrier said. “Might I have a look anyway? I’m the Doctor, by the way.” He stuck out a paw.
“Stavros Kypriakos,” the goat said, taking the paw briefly and shaking it once. He spurned the pad with a fingertip. “Here. It is a problem that has defied me for weeks now.”
“Hmm.” The Doctor glanced down at the pad and studied the ranks of equations on the paper as he sat down uninvited. Tegan stood by, splitting her attention between the Doctor and the passing crowd.
He held out his paw for the pencil, and Kypriakos gave it to him. The Doctor changed one symbol, added another, and passed the pad back to the goat. “Have a look at that.”
Kypriakos narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the terrier before glancing at the pad. He blinked and studied it again, his frown turning to a look of complete amazement. He slowly looked up at the Doctor, who grinned.
“You . . . you solved it . . . “
The Doctor shrugged. “You overlooked the variance in Equation Six. After that, everything fell into place - ”
Before he could react, the goat launched himself at the terrier, hugging him and bussing him on both cheeks before sitting back down, gazing raptly at the completed problem while the Doctor looked crossly at his companion. Tegan was almost doubled over laughing. “Doctor, I cannot thank you sufficiently!” Kypriakos said. “What are you a Doctor of?”
“Oh, well, this and that.”
“Well, nevertheless, you have been a Godsend, and I must reward you.” He started patting himself down and suddenly seemed to notice the kangaroo standing nearby. “And is this young woman with you, Doctor?”
“Yes, she is. We’re on our way back to Australia.”
“Ah! But first,” and the goat pulled two pieces of pasteboard from his suit pocket. “Here, please. They are, ah, grandstand passes for the races. General seating, but I must reward you somehow for your assistance.”
“Oh, well, really it was nothing – “
“Nothing! Nonsense,” Kypriakos declared. “No one must say that the greatest designer of aircraft the world has ever seen would fail to reward someone for their help. I insist.”
The Doctor debated whether to compare the man’s stubbornness with that of a four-footed goat from Earth, and almost immediately thought better of it. The terrier smiled broadly and took the tickets. “Thank you so much, Mister – “
“Doctor.”
“Doctor Kypriakos, yes. Thank you again. Come along, Tegan.” The Doctor stood up, nodded pleasantly to the goat, and rejoined his companion at the edge of the crowd.
“Well,” and he brandished the tickets, “we should have some time to wander around before we try to get the TARDIS out of this universe, so would you like to watch the air races?”
“That’d be fun,” Tegan replied.
end
Category Story / Fantasy
Species Dog (Other)
Size 120 x 92px
File Size 34.5 kB
Listed in Folders
I remember seeing the obvious joy on Tom's face as he played #4. Besides the incredibly cheesy special effects (which could be immensely entertaining in their own right), it was his personality and charm that won us over. I specifically remember him helping another actor during shooting.
The other man was a constable, I believe. The two, plus whoever was the doctor's assistant at the time, were discussing what should happen next. The man playing the constable suddenly fumbled over his words, obviously having forgotten them. Tom smiled and quickly spoke up, saying, "Were you just about to suggest we go outside for a look around?" To which the other actor responded with a relieved tone and a sheepish grin, "Yes, that's it!" My whole family looked at each other, astounded that they left an obvious blooper (that Tom had saved with quick thinking) in the final edit.
It wasn't quite the same after Tom left. Peter Davidson was nice, but I could only see him as Triston Farnon from the "All creatures great and small" series. I half expected him to ask K9 if he was feeling well.
The other man was a constable, I believe. The two, plus whoever was the doctor's assistant at the time, were discussing what should happen next. The man playing the constable suddenly fumbled over his words, obviously having forgotten them. Tom smiled and quickly spoke up, saying, "Were you just about to suggest we go outside for a look around?" To which the other actor responded with a relieved tone and a sheepish grin, "Yes, that's it!" My whole family looked at each other, astounded that they left an obvious blooper (that Tom had saved with quick thinking) in the final edit.
It wasn't quite the same after Tom left. Peter Davidson was nice, but I could only see him as Triston Farnon from the "All creatures great and small" series. I half expected him to ask K9 if he was feeling well.
How wonderful to find another Spontoon story from you! It's such a richly varied world, part of the living heritage of the fandom. I admire and respect everyone who contributes there :)
SEP field – your own idea, or is it canon from the Dr Who universe? Either way, it's brilliant!
You capture Tom Baker's style perfectly here. The Doctor is completely unfazed at his own fuzzy changes, even liking them – yeah, I can totally understand him reacting that way. And you get his quirky mannerisms and his snark dead on. “I must remember to recalibrate the dimensional stabilizers” and the bit about the pouch hygiene were absolutely priceless.
Bravo! And thank you for brightening my morning :D
SEP field – your own idea, or is it canon from the Dr Who universe? Either way, it's brilliant!
You capture Tom Baker's style perfectly here. The Doctor is completely unfazed at his own fuzzy changes, even liking them – yeah, I can totally understand him reacting that way. And you get his quirky mannerisms and his snark dead on. “I must remember to recalibrate the dimensional stabilizers” and the bit about the pouch hygiene were absolutely priceless.
Bravo! And thank you for brightening my morning :D
Thank you!
I can't claim the SEP field - The late great Douglas Adams created it for his book Life, the Universe, and Everything, part of his Hitchhiker's Guide series. Adams also wrote for Doctor Who at times.
I first saw the series when Tom Baker was the Doctor, and I always liked his style.
Glad I could brighten your morning!
I can't claim the SEP field - The late great Douglas Adams created it for his book Life, the Universe, and Everything, part of his Hitchhiker's Guide series. Adams also wrote for Doctor Who at times.
I first saw the series when Tom Baker was the Doctor, and I always liked his style.
Glad I could brighten your morning!
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