Doctor Basil Brown’s time machine worked–it really worked–and now he and Bill need to get going before the clock runs out… even if they pick up someone else along the way… [a Doctor Who/Back to the Future AU]
The TARDIS rattled and shook as it wheezed to a stop. Eventually, everything stilled, causing the two occupants to take pause.
“You think it worked?” Bill wondered.
“There’s only one way to find out,” the Doctor said. He opened the TARDIS door and stepped out into the dark workshop. There were a few things tossed here and there, but to Bill, it was completely unrecognizable. To the Doctor, on the other hand… “We did it!”
“We did…?”
“This was how the workshop looked when River and I bought the house!” he gasped. He turned back towards Bill, expression manic with glee. “We went back in time! This is proof!”
“Okay, I believe you, just…” Bill peeked outside the window and saw that it was already dark. “Do you know what day it is?”
“We’ll figure that out later—let’s compare watches.” They did, and both were the same: 18:07. “We should make sure to head back here by half past eight, just to make sure.”
“…and if we don’t make it in time?”
“We’ll be stuck here as the TARDIS jettisons itself back to our home time period,” he said gravely. “Now let’s go and see if the library’s still open. We might run into your mum on the way.”
It was difficult to get the plywood off the door from the inside, but the Doctor and Bill both were able to push their way out of the workshop and into the darkening streets of St. Luke’s. There were shops that had changed, ones that had stayed the same, and—despite the buildings almost all being intact from what it was in the future—there were plenty of visual markers that said they were in the 1980s. Women were walking by with some of the biggest hair styles Bill’d seen in a long time and it felt as though she was looking at several film sets all at once. She glanced around, marveling at their surroundings.
“Cor… I knew not a lot changes here far as the buildings and whatnot, but I didn’t think it was that bad…”
“Welcome to the Dark Ages, when Thatcherism somehow reigned supreme and many couldn’t get through the decade without hard drugs,” the Doctor shrugged. He glanced over at her, who was giving him a weird look. “Hey—it’s a miracle any of us got out of this decade alive, let alone with all our wits about us.”
“It makes me wonder what I’ll be saying about my youth,” she deadpanned. They continued walking down the pavement to see that their first different building: a dance club that was pumping out some music that Bill didn’t quite recognize, but knew she heard on the classic rock radio station. “I don’t remember this place—this should be the Tesco, yeah? I thought the outside was just brand-related retrofitting.”
“It was demolished before you were born, after a fire had gutted the place,” he explained. “Some young hot-shot was playing around with pyrotechnics for a show and it exploded, catching the stage and the rest of the building on fire. She went down with the ship, so to speak, and they never even found her.”
Bill curled her lip and shuddered. One of the last things she wanted to do is think about ghosts and burning buildings and how the tragedy was so thoroughly forgotten by the time she was a child that the information had been completely new to her as an adult. The Doctor noticed her discomfort and simply shrugged.
“Let’s just get to the library and maybe we can actually accomplish what we need to before the time limit. It was in a few different spots before it settled on the building you know it as being in, so we have to get moving if we’re to check all the locations in time.”
Just as the Doctor and Bill were about to walk by the club, a young woman burst out of the building absolutely furious. She was positively drenched, her hair, dress, and the military-looking coat resting on her shoulders looking rather ruined.
“I’m going to kill him,” she seethed, fists balled tightly. Her accent was slightly jarring, with Blackpool being all over her words to the point the travelers nearly thought they had missed the St. Luke’s mark physically and landed in an eerie lookalike. Bill cleared her throat and her head snapped in the time travelers’ direction. “What?!”
“You wouldn’t know where the library is, would you?” Bill asked cautiously. The other woman looked at the two and raised an eyebrow.
“You look more like you’re going to go clubbing than to the library,” she noted, her brow furrowing as she continued to look at the strangers. Her eyes lingered on the Doctor, taking in his appearance before she brought her attention back to Bill. “Besides, it is probably closed for the night.”
“It’s a long story,” the Doctor said. He looked at the woman’s soaked form and took off his jacket, trading it for the one on her shoulders, which he then tied around her waist. “Can you please show us? After that we can walk you home, show up the pudding-brain that ditched you.”
The woman looked at him, clearly considering the offer. “Alright—follow me. The name’s Clara Oswald.”
“I’m Bill Potts.”
“…and people call me the Doctor.”
“The Doctor, hmm?” Clara smirked. She began to walk, figuring they would keep up with her quick steps; it was clear she was used to keeping stride with long-legged people. “What, are you the sort of person who simply crooks his finger and people follow?” She glanced over at Bill and tilted her head, tone turning serious. “Are you alright?”
“Uh… yeah…?”
“He’s not… forcing you to be here, is he?”
Bill burst into laughter at that, unable to stop herself. “The Doctor’s more like my dad, and a decent one at that.” That caused Clara to glance back at the Doctor to see that his face was turning a bright pink color. “We’re just here to meet up with a couple of people, then catch our ride to leave. No worries.”
“…and one of them works at the library, then?”
“Precisely,” the Doctor said. “You wouldn’t happen to know Melody Pond, would you?”
“Can’t say that I do, but I’m pretty new around here myself.” Her pace began to quicken as he expression darkened. “I’m thinking this is going to be more temporary than I had originally intended. Had been here with a bloke in a rented flat, but considering the fact he just up and disappeared on me… it’s probably time I head back home and figure out where to go from here.”
“So, your boyfriend ditched you after you were subject to some sort of—I assume—water-based prank and now you’re ready for an immediate change?” Bill surmised with a grin. “It’s a shame, really, ‘cause it’s almost like I know a guy.”
“How so?”
“I think that’s enough of that,” the Doctor said, his ears a nice, bright red now. “Let’s just get to the library, please.”
“Sorry, Glasgow—this Melody Pond of your must be some lady for you to follow her all the way here. I can respect that.”
“It’s a bit difficult to explain,” he shrugged. “All I want is a bit of closure, is that so bad?”
“I guess that depends on the closure,” Clara replied. The trio crossed the street and soon the library was in sight. “Are you sure about this? Why not wait until it’s open tomorrow?”
“There’s not exactly time,” the Doctor said. He maneuvered himself so that he was ahead of Bill and Clara and took the lead, heading straight for the building in question.
“Is he actually your dad?” Clara asked Bill in a hushed tone.
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “Just a friend… one I help out a lot.”
“You sound like you’ve lived here your entire life, though, and he does not.”
“I have, but…” They were now on the library, the three able to walk in without a problem. “Why is the library open this late?”
“I must have misjudged the time,” Clara said. “It looks like it’s only just before seven—library closes at nine.”
“That’s… impressive…”
“You’re telling me—I never lose track of time like that,” Clara noted. “I must have spent only half an hour or so in that club. It was so torturous that it felt like ages.”
“Speaking of, how did you get all—”
“Sshhh, I think the Doctor’s found his gal.” Clara pointed towards the Doctor; he was standing in the middle of the main entryway, staring in both terror and yearning. There, on the other side of the room from the entrance, was the woman who Bill remembered from her childhood, whom she most often saw in photos. Melody Pond, before she changed her name to River Song for publishing purposes and had gotten her doctorate in library sciences, was shelving books. Her hair was not the same blonde that Bill remembered, but her curls were instead a light brown, pulled back into a ponytail that just barely contained them, despite the fact that they would have been the envy of all those out on the pavement in their volume alone. It was without a doubt, unequivocally, Doctor River Song roughly fifteen years before she passed away.
She was there, and Doctor Basil Brown was frozen.
“Get over here,” Bill hissed, pulling the Doctor off towards some tall shelving units. “Stop standing there with your mouth gaping like a schoolboy who saw his first pair of tits.”
“I can’t help it,” he growled back. “That’s my wife.”
“Wait… you’re married to her?” Clara wondered. Oh yeah, that’s right, she was there as well. “That’s… erm… unexpected.”
“Not married yet, so calm yourself,” he replied firmly. “I need to get just ten minutes alone with her. That’s all I want.”
“You can do a lot in ten minutes.”
“Yeah, and everything I want to do is talk.” He looked at Clara and Bill and exhaled heavily, knowing that this was going to be the culmination of everything that he had been working towards for the past ten, fifteen years. “Just let me have this, alright?”
“…Basil…?!”
Bill and the Doctor both froze at the sound of his name, fearful that they were already discovered. They poked their heads around the shelving unit to see that Melody was looking at him… a younger version of him, who was approaching her with flowers in one hand and a devilish grin on his face.
“What the bloody hell is that?!” Bill whispered. “You never said anything about visiting her while she was here?!”
“I don’t remember this!” he fired back. They watched as his past self kissed Melody, her hands going into his wavy brown hair while he held her with his free arm. Bill felt somewhat nauseous at the amorous display. “Okay, this might complicate things.”
“Oh… that’s… you…” Clara marveled. She looked from the Doctor, to his younger self, and back. “That does complicate things.”
“Like I said: it’s a bit difficult to explain.”
“How difficult do you think it is?” Clara scoffed. “You time-traveled, probably to right a wrong with her, and now you’re here with grey in your hair and a grad student helping you along because you’re no good alone but don’t have a kid of your own to have inherit her curls and your arse.”
“…and how did you…?”
“I teach literature in my spare time—this seems like a pretty solid conclusion to a melodrama.” Clara then glanced over at Bill and pursed her lips in thought. “Then why are youhere…?”
“I wanted to meet my mum,” Bill admitted. Clara nodded at that.
“I’d meet my mum again if I could; I get it.” She kept her eye on the younger version of the Doctor as he took Melody by the arm and led her out of the building. “Shit—they’ve gone.”
“This complicates a lot,” the Doctor said, sounding like a broken record. “I can’t meet myself—the implications could be catastrophic.” His face glazed over for a moment before a grimace overtook him. “Oh… actually, I do remember tonight.”
“Did you at least get a leg up?” Clara asked. The Doctor shrugged wordlessly—of course he did. “Let’s go and figure out if we can get a hold of Bill’s mum, then see if we can get between yourself and your future wife long enough for you to say your goodbyes.”
“I don’t think I appreciate the tone you’re taking with preemptiving this mission,” he interjected.
“Well, you’re obviously going to be busy, so let’s at least see if we can find a phone book in the meantime,” Clara said. The Doctor looked at Bill in an attempt to find an ally, only to get the opposite response he wanted: Bill looking at Clara with hope in her eyes.
He really was off his game, wasn’t he?
-_-_-_-_-_-_-
“Are you sure your mum never went by another name?” Clara asked. The three were huddled around an open phone booth, with Clara quickly thumbing through the directory. Bill was holding her mobile over the book so she could use it as a torch, which impressed the other woman.
“Nope—never changed her name,” Bill said, shaking her head. “I know I live in the house my foster mother grew up in, but she never had much contact with my mum outside of school. Her parents would still be there, most likely, and that does us no good.”
“…and what about you?” Clara asked the Doctor. “Do you remember where your liaison took place?”
“I remember, and it wasn’t merely a liaison,” he blushed. “This was the night I first proposed.”
Bill looked at her mentor, not entirely certain she was processing everything properly. “You brought us back to the night you proposed?! As in proposed marriage?!How did you forget that?!”
“I tried to aim for a certain date, but it didn’t seem to work out,” he shrugged. “Come on… how was I supposed to know that tonight was when we’d go back?”
“It just sounds like you’re a horrible driver,” Clara cut in. The Doctor scowled at her.
“You don’t drive a time machine.”
“You certainly did try if you were able to come back this far.”
Unable to counter that, the Doctor simply folded his arms across his chest. “I don’t see you being able to drive a time machine any better.”
“Mmmhmm, yeah, just be glad I’m not reporting the two of you to the police for being utter weirdos.” She glanced at Bill’s mobile and raised an eyebrow. “If that’s supposed to be a phone, why don’t you just call on it?”
“The technology used to connect this to other phones won’t come into the area for another twenty years, and that would be in the infant stages,” she explained. “It’s not all super tech and flying cars in the future.”
“It’s the future, not Thunderbirds,” Clara shrugged. She closed the phone book and shook her head. “Do you have any idea as to where she would be hanging about?”
“No,” Bill replied quietly, turning off the light on her mobile. “She might not be here.”
“Alright, then, we should probably go and at least take care of tracking down the Doctor’s younger self and Miss Melody, get something done tonight, and maybe get lucky and run into your mum on the way” Clara decided. “Do you remember where she lived? Was it a flat or a house?”
“She rented a house, not too far from where we need to be,” he said. “After we were married and here permanently, we bought the bicycle garage on Grynden Lane and the attached house.”
“You live there in the future…?” Clara cringed. “Well, I guess you’d need a lot of space to build a time machine…”
“Not as much as you’d think,” Bill said. She followed the Doctor and Clara as they began to walk in the direction of some residential streets. Falling back a few paces, she kept looking around at their surroundings, taking in the disturbingly-stubborn similarities between the St. Luke’s she knew and the one she currently was in. It was a bit surreal… okay, it was more than just a bit surreal, but it was still interesting all the same.
Then, just as they were getting ready to turn a corner, she saw something out the corner of her eye. Down the street was a group of people all crowded around something. She tried to get a better look and saw that it was a group of teenagers crowding around a particularly short one, a backpack being held high over her head.
Shit.
“Basil, hold on,” Bill said before changing course. She stormed up to the group with her best cross-face on. “Oi, you, what do you think you’re doing?!”
“Wouldja look at that?” the lad holding the backpack chuckled. “The little freak has a friend.”
“Look at that: your manners are appalling,” Bill fired back. “Now give her the backpack. It is hers, right?”
“It’s ours now,” another lad scoffed. “Maybe she shouldn’t carry dangerous shite on her if she doesn’t want it liberated.”
“Give it back!” the teenaged girl snarled, jumping up in an attempt to get her stuff back. She just barely hooked her finger on the zipper pull, getting a couple things to fall out of the opening. “I worked hard on this stuff! You’re just jealous!”
“Billie! What are you doing?!” the Doctor shouted as he approached the group. The offending teens all caught sight of the older man rushing towards them and bolted, not wanting to incur the wrath of what they thought could have been a legitimate grown-up. As they ran away, Bill knelt down and helped the teen girl pick up the things that had dropped—they were small and round, only about the size of a golf ball, and looked like prop bombs.
“Thanks,” the teen said. She started stuffing the items in her jacket, which was covered in patches and pins. “Those arseholes made off with most of it—damn it.”
“What was that?” Bill asked.
“I’m headed towards my job—I do stagework at the club,” she explained. “The special effects were in there.” The teen saw the Doctor and stood up straight, raising an eyebrow. “What, are you her dad or something?”
“I might as well be, considering how much she listens to me,” he grumbled. “Come on, Bill, we don’t have that much time left before we have to go.”
“Alright—sorry about that… uh…”
“Ace,” the teen grinned. She shook Bill’s hand and ran off, headed towards the center of town.
“What did I tell you?!” the Doctor whispered angrily. “No changing the past.”
“You would have done the same thing if you noticed first.” He frowned at that, with her smiling smugly in response. “Come on now, we’ve got to go, right?” They then went and joined their somewhat-native guide, who seemed very amused at the entire situation.
A few more turns in the street and finally the Doctor, Bill, and Clara found the house that was currently being rented by one Melody Williams. It was at the edge of town, with some more trees and shrubbery around it to cocoon it from the rest of the neighborhood. That made the trio breathe a sigh of relief—there would be that many fewer chances that they’d be caught. With no lights on from the front of the house, they went around to the back garden and saw nothing was on back there either.
“We have to be upstairs,” the Doctor figured. He kept his voice low; attention was the last thing he wanted at that moment. “I’ll have to check.”
“By what, breaking into the house?” Bill hissed. He shook his head and took a chair from the patio, placing it underneath where a second-story window sat. “You’re not going to reach with that.”
“Not by myself, no,” he said, gesturing to the chair. “Come on so I can stand on your shoulders.”
“Why me?!”
“I know you can handle my weight because you’ve carried me out of things before,” he said. “Besides, she doesn’t even scrape my chin in heels.”
“Then hold her up—she looks light.”
“…and have you forgotten what she’s wearing?” They glanced over at Clara—she seemed mostly dry now, if her dress was still a bit on the ruined side—and she shrugged. “I’m not here to invoke that.”
“Wise move, Glasgow,” Clara smirked. She gave him a wink and he went red in the face, turning around so he faced the house. Why did she suddenly look really good in his old jacket?
“Let’s get going Bill; I don’t need you two seeing me and River together, alright?”
“Fine…” Bill sighed. She stood on the chair with the Doctor and helped him attempt to scale the stone wall, finding handholds until he was able to set his boots on her shoulders. Holding him in place by his ankles, she struggled to stay steady, hoping that he would be quick. “Any luck up there?”
“…I didn’t realize my body could bend that way back then…”
“Okay, you’re confirmed to be in the middle of a shag, now get off me!”
The Doctor lingered in the window for a moment before complying, easing himself down until he could jump without injuring himself. He looked over at Clara, still blushing, and tried to play it cool.
“It looks like we’ve got a clear shot.”
“Funny, so do I,” she noted. He saw she was looking down, so he followed her line of vision—watching his younger self in the middle of a premarital tumble with his future wife accidentally made him a bit tight in the trousers. Clearing his throat, he maneuvered the jacket around his waist so that it rested in front of his fly.
“We need to distract my past self so that I can talk to my wife,” he said, attempting to sound nonchalant.
“Well, we better hurry up, because we only have ten minutes before we have to head back,” Bill mentioned, looking at her watch. “What do you propose we do?”
“How about throwing some pebbles up at the window?” Clara offered. She pointed at the small rocks sitting along the wall of the house, barely bigger than pea gravel. “That can get your attention, while not going and damaging anything—”
“Hey! Who are you?!” The trio looked towards the back of the garden to see the neighbor behind the house looking over the wall at them. “Miss Williams! Miss Williams! There’s someone in your garden!”
“Shit! Run!” the Doctor panicked. The three of them rushed out of the garden and back down the street, hoping that they could keep from being caught again by the neighbor. “That bloody Mrs. Bleaker—always was too much of a busybody for our own good.”
“I guess this is a wash then,” Bill frowned. “We couldn’t see my mum, couldn’t get to talk to your wife… the only good thing that happened is that we ran into Clara.”
A heavy silence fell on them as everything sunk in. The Doctor had achieved a miraculous feat by being able to travel back in time, and yet the reasons he went were completely out of his control. He sighed heavily and scratched the back of his scalp.
“I’m sorry; let’s head back, Bill,” he said. He then turned to Clara. “I guess this is goodbye.”
“I’ll walk you back,” she said. She took his arm and they continued on, heading back to the workshop. By the time they were able to work their way into the building, the TARDIS was beginning to wheeze.
“Shit! It’s started!” The Doctor gasped. “Hurry, Bill! Before it’s too late!”
“…but Doctor…!”
“We’ll try again in the morning! There’s no time!” He shoved her towards the police box and they jammed themselves in. The machine was just about to disappear when Clara opened the door and squeezed in herself, shocking the other two.
“What are you doing?!” Bill asked.
“You don’t get to just leave like that,” Clara answered. She then looked at the Doctor as the box began to rumble. “You didn’t give a proper goodbye. Who gives a proper goodbye by running off without a word?”
“Do you realize what you’ve just done?!” he asked. “We’re going forward in time! Skipping over thirty years!” Clara instead grinned at him.
“Sounds like a better adventure than anything that idiot can give me.”
