As soon as my eyelids flashed open, I jumped up, my breath catching in the back of my throat as I almost lost my balance. I looked around my surroundings furiously, realising I wasn't at home.

In fact, I wasn't sure where I was, as I found myself inside an orange room, the walls panelled with metal, the floor being hard and bumpy metal. In the centre there was what looked like a control pad with a cylindrical tube linking up to the controls. It looked so mismatched, like a mechanic had just patched bits and bobs together to make a model, but at the same time it was so sleek and elegant in an endearing way, the wear and tear of it showing it was clearly loved. There was also something about it that made me note that it was out of this world, something that couldn't possibly be from Earth. Whatever this room was, it was as alien as the thing that had attacked me.

Upon my thoughts drifting to the creature, I gasped, looking down at my shoulder, only to notice I was now out of my blazer and my shirt was torn away where my arm was, where the wound was wrapped in a small white bandage. Frowning, I curiously prodded the fabric of the bandage, wondering who would have fixed me up, until the memories came back.

That man... the Doctor.

"I brought you into the TARDIS after you passed out, how you feeling now?" I heard a voice call from behind me, and when I spun around, I was greeted by the sight of the Doctor. As our eyes met, I realised I must have looked terrified, as his face twisted up into another grin. "It's alright, you're safe, if Rose could trust me I'm sure you can manage it too,"

I nodded slowly, still taking my surroundings in. It was all so bizarre, so unlike any other situation I'd ever been in. Part of me thought that maybe I was still dreaming, but another part of me found myself hoping that none of it was a dream, that it was all real.

"What'd you do? How long have I been out? Shit, Jay and Karrie are gonna kill me, I should have been home hours ago!" I spoke too quickly, my mind suddenly grasping everything that had gone on.

"It's alright, trust me," he spoke gently again, his face turning serious as he moved closer to me. His face seemed so calm, so collected and safe that I instantly began to trust him. "I used some anti-venom then bandaged you up. The rest of your stuff is over by the console. You were passed out for about an hour, do you want me to give you a ride home?"

I looked around me once more, breaking the eye contact between me and the Doctor. I wandered over to the console, looking closer at the switches and buttons, the knobs and dials, running my hand over some of them carefully, my mind trying to understand all of the sights around me.

"Is this what this is then? Some sort of pimped out bus where you pick up people who've been assaulted by aliens, fix them up then drop them home?" I asked, the whole idea sounding crazy, though it made him laugh and nod.

"Pretty much, yeah, you got me," he laughed.

"Seriously though, what is this place?" I frowned, curiosity getting the better of me. "And who are you exactly?"

"Like I said, I'm the Doctor, no one really, just a traveller, and 'this place', as you call it, is my TARDIS," he began to explain, a certain sense of authority in his tone. "T-A-R-D-I-S, stands for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space. It's a spaceship of some sort. I can travel to the past, future, different planets, different galaxies, and sometimes different dimensions if we get the ship on a good day, all in time to be back home for chips. Is that alright?"

I wasn't entirely sure how to react. It was a lot of information, a lot of information that seemed so radical and ridiculous but yet I seemed to just instantly accept it. I wasn't entirely sure why I believed him, but I did, and I found myself laughing. Laughing from shock, from happiness, from insanity.

"Hang on a sec," I said through laughter, turning back towards the double doors which resembled the inside of a phone box's.

Pulling the door open, I stepped out to see I was in the exact same woods I had been attacked in. I never noticed a building, how was this possible? Stepping out even further and turning around, I found myself standing in front of an old Police Public Call box. I'd heard about them in books, and my Dad had told me stories about the ones that were around when he was a kid, except there weren't any anymore. If the TARDIS is a time machine, why is it inside a Police Box from the sixties... and how?

How the hell was it bigger on the inside?

Running around the box, I found myself back at the doors, looking in at the interior I had been surrounded by previously, the Doctor leaning against the console, watching me with a small smile. Our eyes met and he waved, holding back a laugh when he caught my shocked expression.

"It's bigger on the inside!" I screamed, running back in, slamming the doors shut behind me. "It's bigger on the inside! How the hell... wait, no don't tell me... another dimension right? Crammed into a smaller one? That's possible right? That's physics isn't it?"

"Yep, that's physics!" he seemed to cheer, as if excited I'd grasped it.

"This is amazing, I mean it's insane and mad, but amazing!" I gasped out, shaking my head. "Either I've been watching too much Star Wars, or I hit my head out there, or I'm insane, this can't be real,"

"It is real," he nodded.

"I mean, it's real, all of it, everything Rose told me that I didn't believe," I shook my head, fighting disbelief.

"She told you about all of this?" he frowned. I could tell by the look on his face when I said her name that the Doctor cared about Rose a lot, a look of protectiveness sweeping over him, his face softening with kindness ever so slightly.

"Yeah, when she came back after she was missing, I was there at her flat, guessing you don't remember me being there?" I nodded.

"Nope, don't remember," he shrugged. "You were just another human back then, not someone who's life I'd have to save. Hang on, that was the night in Downing Street, with the Slitheens! Where were you then?"

My eyes darted to the floor ashamedly, remembering the way Karrie had picked me up from Rose's flat after an hour, insisting I needed to be safe with them, especially as things started getting really bad. I'd made Rose make sure she'd text me updates on what was happening but she must have gotten swept away with everything because I didn't get a text until the next morning, when the war had been defused and the world was back to normal. Even then, it was a text from Mickey, saying everything was back to the way it should be, and Rose was gone again.

Everyone else seemed to just forget about the whole 'alien' ordeal, but I didn't want to. Part of me never wanted to forget the danger we'd been in that night, and the possibilities that were in store that night. It didn't help that my cousin was in the centre of it all, and I was locked in at home under the protection of two people who claimed to be my foster parents. I guess, to an extent, that I was jealous that Rose had the opportunity to go off and escape mundane life in London and travel, whilst I was stuck in my boring, dead-end life.

Now though, I guess it didn't have to be that way.

"I was at home," I confessed. "My foster parents didn't want me in any danger. I thought it was stupid but... I wanted to be of help, really, I just..."

"You wanted to be of help, that's more than the rest of humanity can say," he smiled slightly, and I was grateful he seemed to ignore the fact I said 'foster parents', when I was so used to having to explain my situation to people.

"Where is Rose?" I asked after a moment of silence, noting my cousin's absence that instantly made me panic.

"She nipped home for a bit to see her Mum, didn't want her thinking she'd fallen off the face of the Earth again," he explained, leaning against the control pad, and his comment about her going missing made me snort out a small laugh. "I told her I'd pick her up after a few days, so right now I'm alone. But that doesn't matter, I should get you home! Unless..."

"Unless?" I asked him.

"Unless you want to come with me," he stated, shrugging slightly, making his offer seem so casual. "I'm just off wandering time and space, and it is better with two. We could go anywhere, any time, any place, any planet, just say the word. And what is there here holding you back?"

I stared at him, our eyes meeting in contact, my mind racing with the thrill of his offer. I thought about it, knowing that I should go home. Everyone would wonder where I had gone. People would think I'd been kidnaped, maybe even murdered. I may not have a lot of friends, but I'm sure Annie and Jess would be bothered if I just disappeared, leaving them alone at Sixth Form, and without me they'd probably rip each other's heads off. I'd fall behind in school work. Also, how in the hell would I explain the travelling situation to Karrie and Jay who struggled to even cope with me walking home alone? They'd never let me go along with the Doctor, no matter how badly I wanted to.

Except this was a time machine, according to the Doctor, anyway. I could go and neither of them would even have to know. I could go anywhere and no one would have to find out, it could be my own little secret, my secret against the people who acted like they had to know everything about me. It was almost ironic, how my foster parents had controlled my life for years and here I was, making the biggest decision I'd faced since choosing my A Levels and they didn't even have to know anything.

If anything, it was the absurd feeling of freedom that was turning my head wild. For once, I was in control of my own choices, my own life.

And like Rose had told me once, it was a better life with the Doctor. This was my chance to get my own life away from London. It was my chance to experience everything Rose had told me about, my chance to see the world in a way I would never be able to without the Doctor. He was offering me such an amazing opportunity, and as dangerous and reckless as it was, I found it difficult to comprehend how I would even say no.

"Okay," I nodded, a grin spreading across my own face. "Okay, Doctor, let's go travelling!"

Once I'd spoken up, a sense of exhilaration filled my entire being, my mind buzzing with the thoughts of all the adventures I could have with him, all the amazing things I would see that no one else had seen. I could go to the future and see the world as I'd never imagined it, go to the past and see the world as I'd read about it, go to other planets and see entirely new worlds.

I could have so many adventures with the Doctor, all of them better than any I would have in my life without him. My boring, regular life that I had so often wished away under the stars would be gone with him, his presence in my life giving me endless possibilities.

It was as if he was thinking all of this too, as he too seemed almost eager, bounding over to the controls, his entire face lit up.

"Fantastic!"

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Word count: 2082

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