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Friendly Visits Are Just Too Boring

Among the many mythologies, legends, and tales that populate the Universe and its billions of civilizations, there is one particular figure that recurs throughout time and history: the Doctor. There are countless stories from countless cultures, across all three galaxies of the Human Empire, that tell of a man known only as 'the Doctor' who descends from the sky and passes judgment on the wicked, and protects the innocent and helpless.

Perhaps the most curious aspect of this tale is not that it reappears so often throughout otherwise distant and unconnected civilizations, but that tales of the man called the Doctor appear throughout the ages, as well. Stories concerning this mysterious figure range as far back as the Blessed Scriptures of the Prophet Zarquon and up to as recently as the uprising at the Oodsphere two years ago. In fact, almost every scholar on the subject acknowledges the distinct possibility that the Doctor is alive right now, and is currently spreading his legend further throughout this vast universe…

- Professor Zandax !Banau, 'Doctor Who? The Man, the Legend, and the Reality,' Copyright 4128 EC, Clom Galactic Publishers.

All excerpts are used here courtesy of The Library.

The Doctor and his daughter stood opposite each other in the dojo.

Well, he called the room his 'dojo,' and it was indeed decked out just like one, but in reality it was just another room in the TARDIS, ready to become any other at a moment's notice.

Jenny and her father were both clad in the simple brown robes of the warrior monks of the planet Lothar, who practiced one of the Doctor's favourite martial arts (It specialized in nonlethal attack and utilized quite a bit of running).

"Right then, Jenny, you ready?"

She bounced lightly on the balls of her feet. "Yep."

The Doctor smirked and then ran straight at her. She lowered her stance, but he kept right on running, zipping past her.

She turned, and he was in front of her again, keeping her confused by sprinting around in a circle. By adopting a conventional fighter's stance, she had sacrificed mobility for the sake of stability. She spun around again, but the circle had become a spiral and he caught her off-balance.

"Come on! You're thinking like a soldier! I told you to stop that."

She lay on her back where she had fallen, staring at the ceiling. "Well, what am I supposed to be thinking like?"

"A warrior monk! Devoted to the ways of philosophy and peace, the monks of Lothar become poetry in motion, fighting with a style that is graceful, quick, and artistic. Stop being efficient."

Jenny arched her back, bringing her legs around in a spinning kick. The momentum carried her to her feet, and she used that speed to launch herself into a sprint right at her father.

He ducked underneath her strike and his foot struck the square of her back, knocking her on her face this time.

"Wipe that stupid smirk off your face."

It widened instead. "No."

She launched herself at him, but this time caught his strike with hers and flipped over him, landing behind so that they were back-to-back. Briefly. The weight beneath her shoulder disappeared as her father dropped to the ground and rolled so that he was in front of her.

Of course, she had leaned forward to compensate for the sudden lack of support, so that this time she was leaning into his strike.

It hurt.

"Screw this warrior-monk stuff." She heaved herself to her feet, again. "What's the point? I already know twenty other fighting techniques."

The Doctor tossed her a bottle of water. "Because you will be traveling. A lot. And what happens of you meet someone who knows something that you don't?"

She sighed. Lessons again. "I'm at a disadvantage."

"Exactly. So it's really in your best interests to learn everything about everything."

Somewhere, deep within the ancient, living machine, the phone rang.

The two of them paused. The Doctor opened his mouth, as if to say something.

"Dad… there's a… is that a telephone?"

The blond girl stood there for a moment, her words echoing briefly. And then a fluttering brown something bounded past her.

At least, that was what it looked like. The tall, slight man bolted into the hallway, vaulted over a railing and landed one floor below, sprinting off further into the depths of the vessel. With a sigh, Jenny jogged after him.

"Where…did…I…put…Aha!" The man thrust his fist in the air triumphantly, the fist now clutching a cell phone that had just been wrenched out from between a box of screwdrivers (every possible model- from stone to sonic) and the head of a Cyberman.

He put it to his ear. "Hello, again." The grin on his face remains plastered there throughout the entire conversation, even if it does fade slightly once or twice. "Yup. Yup. Oh, I remember him. Really? Can't handle it yourself? Kidding, kidding! Right. Right then. Tell Jack not to shoot or shag any of them. No. No means no. Right, then." The grin widens. "See you soon, Martha."

Jenny raised an eyebrow. "Martha?"

Her father smiled. "Martha."

"Martha Jones?"

"Yes Martha Jones."

She crosses her arms. "So what does that mean?"

He runs his hand through his elaborately casual hairstyle. "What does it mean?" The two of them journey through the TARDIS' vast interior, up and up, until they come to the control panel at the craft's entrance. "It means that we're going to Earth, Jenny."

The Doctor slams a lever, mostly for show, and then dashes about the console inputting a set of familiar coordinates into the machine that is almost as old as he is.

"Oh my God."

"What?" The Doctor looked at the gaping Martha Jones, and then at Jenny standing beside him. "Oh, her?"

"I thought you were dead!" Martha put her hands on Jenny's shoulder's hesitantly, as if unsure that she is real. "I saw you die."

She shrugs. "I got better."

"But… how?"

The Doctor sighed loudly. "Ah, really sort of complicated. I can give you a scientific explanation, if you like."

Martha looked up at him pleadingly. "Am I going to understand it?"

"Not a chance. Sorry."

She and Jenny exchanged knowing glances, before Jenny offered a simple explanation. "Remember that sphere thingy?"

"Oh, right, the life-sphere thingy."

"Well the concentrated life-sphere energy from the life-sphere thingy apparently activated the dormant Time Lord DNA that had been made dormant by the human cloning process, and it allowed me to regenerate."

"But… you still look the same."

"Aha!" The Doctor shouted. "An impasse! Allow me to explain-"

"Well," Jenny continued, ignoring him, "The life-sphere thingy apparently had a lot of life-sphere energy that was single-handedly life-spherisizing-"

The Doctor yelped in genuine physical pain at this. It is a recessive genetic trait among Time Lords that select individuals cannot physically stand to hear someone bastardizing a scientific explanation.

"Ahem. Life-spherisizing the entire planet. So the sudden upswing in energy was enough to spark the regeneration process, and the excess energy from the process was siphoned off by the planet itself."

Martha turned to the Doctor. "That actually made sense. I actually understood that. I think that I like her more than I like you." She smiled, and hugged both of the Time Lords warmly. "What was your explanation, anyways?"

The Doctor sighed. "I was going to say something about reversing polarities." It was an equally rare condition among Time Lords that they were compelled to falsify scientific explanations with relentless technobabble. The Doctor, suffering from both conditions, was constantly tearing himself up inside.

"So, then," Jenny said, "I'm guessing that we're just not here for a friendly visit."

"It's never a friendly visit, is it?" Martha laughed. "Friendly visits are just too boring."

"Well, they are," the Doctor said defensively.

"Nevermind." Martha turned from the center of Roald Dahl Plass, where the TARDIS was parked, and beckoned for them to follow. "Let's get into Torchwood Three, and Jack will explain. And Mickey's there, too- do you remember? He joined up with us after- well, you know."

They followed her to the invisible elevator that was the entrance to the Cardiff branch of Torchwood. The head branch, now.

"Hey, cool," Jenny remarked upon observing how the device worked. The three of them descended into the cool underground, where they were greeted by an old friend.

"Well, hello! Who are you?" A handsome, energetic man bounded forward at the sight of the Doctor, but almost immediately turned to greet Jenny instead.

"Call me Jenny," she smiled.

He shook her hand delicately, and his eyes widened. "Quite the grip you have there."

She shrugged. "Well, I'm not exactly human."

He raised an inquisitive eyebrow. "Interesting. What are you, then, if not human?"

Jenny smiled again. "I'm a Time Lord."

Jack Harkness promptly did the mother of all double-takes, and stepped back to look at the Doctor. "Very interesting. Care to explain, Doctor?"

He gritted his teeth, knowing the reaction that would inevitably accompany his explanation. "She's my daughter."

"Okay. Even more interesting- I need details."

"She's a clone from- well, half clone DNA projection of- an extrapolation based upon biological- Martha, just explain it to him later."

The four of them looked back and forth at each other, and Jack sighed. "Right. A clone. Not as interesting as I had hoped."

"Can we get past this?"

"Fine."

Mickey Smith- the newest member of Torchwood Three- entered the room and caught sight of the Doctor. "Oi! They told me you'd be dropping by. Who's the assistant?"

"Who's the assistant? Rickey-"

"Mickey."

"Mickey. How polite is that, to just ask, 'who's the assistant?'"

"How polite is it to forget my name?"

"That's beside the point."

Mickey turned to Jenny. "Hello. Mickey Smith. Pleased to meet you."

Jenny smiled back. "Hi, Mickey. Jenny. I'm the Doctor's daughter."

Mickey wheeled about. "What!? Your daughter?"

"Oh, here we go again." The Doctor waved his hand dismissively. "Martha will, I'm sure, give all of you a nice proper explanation at some point, but the short version of it is that Jenny is a clone. Happy now?"

Jack and Mickey nodded.

"Good!" He turned to Jack. "Where's the rest of the Torchwood team?"

"You mean Gwen and Ianto? Well, they're in London- off dealing with the problem that Martha called you about. Not that they can do much- they're saying that you're the only person they'll negotiate with."

The Doctor stroked his chin thoughtfully. Or at least, he tried to. He'd shaved that morning- there wasn't enough stubble there yet for a good thoughtful chin-stroke. Shame. "First I need you to… ah, brief me on the situation. That the right word? Brief… yeah, it is."

"Yeah," Jenny said, "What did you call him about? And who are they?"

Jack beckoned them deeper into the underground complex. "The aliens of London."

The group followed him through Torchwood three, until they came to a room with several comfortable chairs. Sitting, Jack continued. "As I'm sure most of you are aware, there are actually a good deal of aliens living on Earth. Now, long ago, there was a strict set of rules established for these aliens. That was you."

Jack pointed at the Doctor, who did a mock bow. "I tried to be very reasonable. How do they go?"

"One," said Jack, "They must live within a hundred kilometres of a government-sanctioned extraterrestrial control organization. For example, us, and UNIT. Two, they must never reveal to humans that they are, in fact, aliens. And three, they may never kill or harm a human."

"With some exceptions to all three," The Doctor noted. "Say… the provision that an alien may harm a human or reveal their identity in self-defence, or some of the aliens that require a human host body may take one."

"You know," Mickey said, "I'm not exceptionally happy about that. Why are we letting some of these aliens kill innocent people?"

"Because they need to in order to survive." The Doctor knew that Mickey would never understand, not really- every species innately believed that their survival came before all else. "If they wanted, it's likely that they could take Earth for themselves, anyways. The only reason that they agree to live by the rules I've imposed upon them is because they know I could single-handedly throw them all out if I wanted."

"So you saved the world through peaceful negotiation? That's a change." Jenny smirked.

"Well, it was bound to work sometime."

"But," Jack went on, "A few weeks ago, they suddenly decided that they didn't need to worry about your set of rules anymore. There's been a dramatic upswing in the amounts of alien-related violence lately, and quite a few murdered humans."

"What's more," Martha chimed in, "they're not even being subtle about it. It's right up front, to the point where the citizens are becoming suspicious. And, they're threatening to reveal themselves to the public at large."

"Unless?"

Martha looked him right in the eye. "Unless you renegotiate their terms personally. We tried to contain the situation for a few weeks, but eventually things got out of control."

The Doctor was silent for a while. Then, he turned to Jack. "It can't be all of the aliens behind this. Some of them are far too peaceful for this, and others respect the humans too much."

Jack began shuffling through a bundle of papers on one of the desks. He pulled a plain filing folder out of the pile, and handed it to the Doctor. "No. Mostly it's the same ones it's always been, but they're acting on it instead of just complaining this time around. As far as we can tell, the ringleaders are that family of Malsangurians. The vampires."

The Doctor pulled a picture of a middle-aged man and woman out of the folder. Asiman and Lilith. The patriarch and matriarch of the vampire tribe inhabiting London. "Well," he said, standing up, "There's only one thing for it. We go to London and I'll try to talk things out with them."

"Think it'll work this time?" Jack asked.

"No." There was only one real reason why the aliens would disobey his orders.

"Here's what I don't get," Mickey said, as the five of them left Torchwood Three in the invisible elevator. "You told us that they were afraid of you, and that's the only reason that they'll obey your terms. So why aren't they, all of a sudden?"

It was Jenny who answered him, having figured it out a short while after the Doctor did.

"Because," she said, "they've found someone who they think can outsmart the Doctor."