The Girl Who Grew Up In The TARDIS (Wattys2014)

"Two strands together, and the Daleks are finished...Have I that right?"

 Not everyone can keep up with the Doctor’s frantic pace and it wasn’t long before the UNIT medical officer Harry parted company, I think he had only come along for the ride to keep an over protective eye on Sarah Jane. It’s a shame really because Harry and Sarah would have made a great couple, I had been right about Barbara and Ian, Polly and Ben, matchmaking in my head for the Doctor’s companions, well I had to have some kind of hobby… For a long time it was just the Doctor and Sarah, they really got each other, the best of friends and a perfect team, she kept the Doctor under control a bit but at the same time he brought out the kid in her as well. Right from the beginning they faced so much together, though the one encounter that stood out was with Davros, the insane creator of the Daleks where the Doctor faced the biggest dilemma (so far) of all his lives and if only we’d known what was to come, I would not have hesitated, I would have wiped every Dalek out and I believe the Doctor would have done the same. Though some of the things the TARDIS showed me gave me nightmares and stayed with me for a long time after, there was the Wirrn, Cybermen with gold allergies, Scottish shape shifting Zygons, killer robots disguised as Egyptian mummies, Krynoids, mad “Frankenstein” scientist on the loose on Karn after the Doctor’s head (No, really) and then there was Eldrad, which turned out to be a challenging day for Sarah Jane but it seemed nothing could part them until on that very same day when the Doctor just upped and left her when he got the call from Gallifrey, humans weren’t allowed there you see, well I’d been there plenty of times but the TARDIS had always kept me hidden away. Of course the Doctor and Sarah were sad to be leaving each other but they hid it well, besides it was a messy and abrupt parting, little time for emotion. But I cried, I was going to miss Sarah Jane, she didn’t chose to leave and I think she would have stayed with the Doctor forever. Though I often wondered why the Doctor never went back for his friend but this version of the Doctor was so easily distracted. Sometimes he could be a bit of a loner but the Doctor had been travelling for a while now and the behaviour pattern of never looking back and always moving forward had become his mantra, the only way the Doctor could live this crazy, carefree existence.

 It was around this time that I began to break through to the Doctor’s consciousness by now the Doctor was about, well I’ve never actually been too sure how old he was (somewhere between four hundred and fifty and seven hundred and forty seven, it depended what mood he was in, though to be fair it was easy to lose track of the years)  anyway he had been around a bit and was growing ever closer to his TARDIS and more in tune with its mysterious workings (still couldn’t fly her properly but there had been less crash landings), so it stands to reason he would have been aware of my presence from time to time, he might have thought they were ghosts from his past and even from his future and in a way the Doctor was right. I was the ultimate ghost except sometimes it seemed the barriers were beginning to dissolve, I would watch him intently in the control room and it seemed at times as though the timelines had become blurred, for a moment he would look troubled and full of melancholy like he knew I was there but there was nothing he could do. Other times I half expected him to turn round and smile with that great, big disarming grin he used to put strangers at their ease and offer me a jelly baby but the Doctor never did turn round. So I had to live with the heartbreak that this wonderfully, kind, generous and looney Doctor would never be my Doctor either. Jelly babies, who knew sweeties could be such an ice breaker and used as a pretend weapon? (I think it’s pretty awesome that the Doctor never uses weapons and solves everything with his brilliant mind) but his jelly babies never seemed to run out and I remember one night having a craving to try some and searching for the Doctor’s supplies but I never found them. Some nights my dreams won’t let me sleep, so clutching my photograph of mum I run to the control room and gaze out at the stars through the window, it can be very still and quiet during those times, well the companions have to sleep occasionally if the Doctor lets them of course! Even the Doctor has been known to have forty winks, I have yet to find his room but during sleepy time when the TARDIS is resting from the time vortex and is anchored somewhere in space the Doctor mostly stalks the infinite TARDIS corridors and in quieter moments the library is his refuge or sometimes he visits old control rooms which are archived and through another window he also watches the stars. Outside there are so many swirling masses of jewel like colours that are constantly changing and all those worlds waiting for us. I still find it hard to pull my gaze away so close I’m certain that if I reached out I can touch those stars.