"Peyton, what's happening!" Clara shrieks as the Time Machine ricochets through the vortex.
"He's shot the system!" Peyton groans, as she dodges out of the way of a shower of sparks. She grabs the monitor again, ripping the wires out the back of it and threading them back through its metal arm. "I can't see anything!"
"I thought you said you could fly this thing!" The Doctor says in his unfamiliar Scottish tone. Peyton glares at him as he continues to flip switches that she knows shouldn't be flicked. "Who are you anyway? You look awfully familiar."
"Doctor, stop helping. You aren't helping!" Peyton yells.
The Tardis shudders violently, sending everyone tumbling to the floor. But Peyton forces herself to her feet. She has to land this thing, but with half the ruddy ship not working, she doesn't know how.
The monitor flickers to life, the picture coming in and out of focus. Her trick must have worked. "Okay, I think I can get us to Earth but... but..."
"What! What now?" Clara groans as she pulls herself along the edge of the console.
"It's like something's attached itself to the outside, like something's dragging us, or we're dragging it."
Clara looks up at Peyton with those brown eyes full of concern.
"Right, I'll aim for Earth," Peyton says making quick work of the console. "Low population density, hopefully not too much damage done. No promises though."
"Great, just get me out of this thing!" Clara screams.
• • •
Peyton struggles to sit up as she rubs the back of her head. The Tardis is full of smoke, thankfully obeying the usual laws of physics and leaving her on the floor mostly alone. She looks over and sees Clara struggling to push herself up from her stomach as well.
"You good?" Peyton manages.
"Yeah, I'm... where's the Doctor?"
They hear the Tardis door open before being slammed shut again.
Peyton stumbles to her feet, batting the smoke from her face and sees the outline of the Doctor through the haze by the doors. He opens the door again, thrusting his head out again. Abruptly slamming it once more the Doctor turns to her, his harsh eyes piercing through the haze into her.
The Doctor is the one to break the staredown, turning back to the doors and poking his head out again.
Peyton turns to Clara and helps her to stand steady on her feet.
"What's he doing?" Clara murmurs, rubbing the back of her head.
Peyton looks over her shoulder to see the Doctor stepping out of the Time Machine, the rumble of his Scottish accent indicates that he's talking to someone, but the ringing in Peyton's ears doesn't quite allow her to catch the conversation.
Peyton steps toward the doors as the Doctor leaves them, disappearing into the grey landscape beyond them. A hand wrapped around her arm stops her though.
"Peyton," Clara says very quietly, her voice still shaking. "Tell me... tell me that everything is going to be fine."
Peyton opens her mouth but no sound comes out, as if her subconscious had closed off her voice, an omen that the promise she is about to make would not be possible to keep. "Let's go."
They're on a beach. Wait, no they're not, across the water there is another strip of pebbles sand laid against a stone wall. A river then.
Peyton sighs in relief at the familiar faces of Strax, Jenny, and Madame Vastra. Then it occurs to her, they're in Victorian London. They crashed landed on the banks of the Thames in the 1890s.
YOU ARE READING
The Time Lord's Apprentice
Fanfiction"But, you're impossible!" "Yeah, and the world is ending, I don't think now is the time." Peyton is an orphan, taken from her mother as an infant by the Unified Intelligence Taskforce. She is raised separately from other children because she is spec...
