The Stranger

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 2.5 | Part 3

Zepheera leaned wearily against the clear acrylic that made up the opening of her kennel. She, the other borrowers, and the rats had all been kept in this large structure made up of dozens of small cubby-like containers, each about the size of a shoebox.

Though, Zepheera supposed now it was just her and the rats.

Each had a secure lock system, and the front hatches thankfully had a few air holes drilled into them. The rest of the walls were opaque, isolating each specimen thoroughly. She couldn’t see the rats she heard scratching futilely at their own walls. Even clean of drugs, Zepheera had given up on escape long ago.

The room was empty, so Zepheera had nothing to look at other than her own hand as it traced the tiny air hole nearby. It was too small for her to reach through, though she’d tried. She’d nearly broken her hand in the process, she recalled distantly. Even the memory of pain couldn’t evoke any emotion in her.

With a loud smash of the door, several human scientists burst into the room. Zepheera blinked slowly as she lifted her head to look at them. They were frantic, screaming and yelling things that couldn’t quite make it into her prison at such a distance.

They were followed by what Zepheera could only describe as metal men. Five entered, one for each scientist, stomping in time. Their soulless black eyes completely disregarded the unit that held Zepheera and the rats.

The metal men spoke in deep, cold voices, but she couldn’t process what they were saying. In short order, they cornered the scientists and touched them with outstretched silver hands. The humans’ bodies succumbed to the electricity shooting through them, and they fell dead the instant they were let go.

Zepheera didn’t even have the capacity to react.

The silver intruders spoke among themselves, but Zepheera couldn’t hear what they were saying. She numbly crawled closer to the air holes, some deep part of her aware that it was important to know what exactly was going on.

“Oi, metalheads!” roared a new voice from the direction of the door. Zepheera calmly turned her head to look, finding a strange-looking man filling the doorway. He wore a brown pinstriped suit with red converse, a style of shoe Zepheera had thought to be long out of style. He was thin as a matchstick and had hair so unruly it could almost be dubbed rebellious. His eyes were wild with adrenaline, aimed solidly at the intruders. “Have you had your shots? Seems to me like you’re due for a booster!”

He hurled a small cylindrical device at the metal men, and it stuck fast right dab in the middle of one’s chest. They all screamed as a massive field of energy surrounded them, and just like the humans before them, they collapsed one by one.

Without missing a beat, the man crossed the room quickly, examining the bodies of the scientists. He sighed when they all turned up dead. Then he stepped over to one of the metal creatures, prying his device off of its chest. He raised a small tool – a probe, it looked like – and activated the charge once again.

His eyes scanned the room as he pocketed the device, passing right over Zepheera before returning in a double take.

“What?” he frowned and walked carefully over.

The most Zepheera was able to react was a slight raise of her eyebrows. By all accounts, she should be scared out of her wits. She’d just watched this man presumably kill a bunch of silver nightmares who had murdered humans moments before. She couldn’t even begin to think what this man could have in store for someone like her, even if she were in a right state of mind.

To her nonexistent surprise, he simply leaned down and peered in at the borrower, concern etched in his features.

“Oh, you poor soul, what have they done to you?”

Zepheera blinked slowly at him.

He clenched his jaw in determination and attempted to open the hatch by hand. She knew he couldn’t do it that way, there were higher levels of security for the test subjects to eliminate chance of escape. Even so, his proximity to her awoke the instincts that had been drilled into her since childhood, and she backed away from him at a sluggish pace.

Abandoning that strategy, the stranger whipped out his probe, buzzing it at the lock. It released and the door swung open. She froze when he reached a hand in, laying it palm-up next to Zepheera.

“Come with me,” he urged, pleading with those big brown eyes.

She stared at his hand for a second, but made no move toward or away from it. The man blinked in confusion at her non-reaction and tried again. “Don’t be afraid, I’m not gonna hurt–”

Before he could finish, more ominous stomping could be heard in the hallway outside. The man glanced between the borrower and the door, conflicted for a moment. Finally, he turned an apologetic look to Zepheera.

“I’m so sorry, there’s no time.” That said, the hand shifted to scoop up the four and a half inch tall woman into its cupped palm.

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Prompt: Wish

This one got loooong xD I just couldn’t stop, and of course I HAD to reference a certain song sung by a certain Cliff Edwards. (Seriously, the timeline is perfect)

Yet another insight to an unseen character from my main story, I am on a roll with these!

In reference to this list of one-word prompts. Feel free to send me one!

5. Wish

Zepheera wandered the dark passages inside the walls of the human flat. She couldn’t sleep. Walking by herself, especially at night, had proven to help Zepheera clear her mind on numerous occasions, and it had become a ritual of sorts.

She perked up as something caught her ear. It sounded like distant music, but it was difficult to make out through the dry wall and layers of dust surrounding her. Excitement filled her heart. The beans never played music this late. She picked up the pace, almost jogging across beams, zipping up ladders much faster than she had ever dared.

Finally, she came across a door, carefully cut to match the wallpaper outside. This led to a side-table in the humans’ sitting room. The door was safely hidden behind knick-knacks and the occasional stack of books, while still providing a decent view of the room beyond. From there, it was usually an easy hop onto the ever-present ottoman to the floor, and from there any good borrower had access to the entire room.

But Zepheera knew better than to enter right away. Instead she eased the door open just a crack and peeked out The lights were still on, as well as the radio on the far side of the room. She could make out a pair of knees on the armchair and a light snoring could be heard behind the radio’s soft violins. She let go of the tension in her shoulders once she knew the human was safely asleep.

Leaving the door cracked, she sat down next to it and closed her eyes as she listened. It was hard to imagine a human bean to match the singer she heard. Beans were massive, dangerously intelligent beasts that existed to provide people like her things to borrower. This voice was crooning, trembling with vibrato, and seemed to float right into her mind. He didn’t sound dangerous at all. This made Zepheera all the more curious as he began a new verse.

If your heart is in your dream
No request is too extreme
When you wish upon a star
As dreamers do

Zepheera frowned. Quite a few of those words eluded her, but from what little she could understand, it seemed to go against what she’d been taught. She inwardly remarked that humans must be very different from borrowers, but kept listening.

Fate is kind
She brings to those who love
The sweet fulfillment of
Their secret longing

“You’re up late.”

She gasped, startled by the sudden voice, and opened her eyes to see her uncle half illuminated by the tiny opening.

“Uncle Boston, you scared me!” Zepheera huffed, crossing her arms indignantly. “Anyway, you’re up, too,” she pointed out.

Boston shrugged. “They left the radio on.”

Zepheera’s expression softened. “Right. Sorry.” Her uncle lived behind the mantelpiece where the radio always sat. This usually didn’t bother him unless he was trying to sleep, like tonight.

He chuckled lightly, white teeth standing out against his brown skin in the dim lighting. He bent to sit next to his young niece. “And anyway, I’m a grown-up and you’re a child. You should be in bed, not out here by yourself.”

Zepheera scoffed. “I’m thirteen,” she reminded him. “Baycliff says I’m almost old enough to get married!”

Boston’s smile faltered in the slightest and he shook his head, his wild halo of black hair swaying in time with the simple motion. “Yeah, well your stepfather doesn’t know you like I do.”

Zepheera couldn’t argue with that. In any case, her uncle wasn’t exactly dragging her back home, so she pulled her knees in close and went back to listening to the radio. A chorus had been added, taking turns with the original singer. They were repeating the last phrase Zepheera had heard, so she hoped she hadn’t missed too much.

Like a bolt out of the blue
Suddenly it comes in view
When you wish upon a star
Your dreams come true

A chill ran up Zepheera’s spine, spreading through her scalp. The strange words combined with the sweet high note the singer ended on moved Zepheera deeply. For one thing, she was no expert on human singing, but it hardly seemed possible for someone to sing such a seemingly astronomical note. And for another…

“Uncle?” she asked quietly as another song began but went ignored. “What’s a star?”

Boston blinked at the sudden question. “Er, well… Do you remember me telling you about the sky?”

Zepheera nodded. She had yet to see it for herself; though her uncle was teaching her to borrow at such a young age, he still insisted there were certain things she wasn’t ready for. One of them being the outside world, and by extension, the sky.

“Well, at night, the sky becomes dark and all these little lights that the beans call stars appear in it.”

Zepheera pondered this, then followed up with another query. “Is it true, then? Can they make wishes come true?”

“Now, Zepheera.” Boston’s naturally kind tone took on a firm edge to it. “We’ve talked about this.”

Heaving a sigh, Zepheera hugged her knees into her chest. “I know, I know…” Her uncle had always emphasized how dangerous it was for borrowers to want for anything apart from basic needs and comforts. If one got too ambitious, they increased their risk of being caught by the beans. And everyone knew that could only end badly.

However, seeing his niece so despondent softened Boston’s heart. He took a deep breath and hopped to his feet. “Let’s go find out for ourselves,” he said, offering a hand to help
Zepheera up.

She looked at his hand quizzically for a moment before sucking in an elated breath. “You mean…?”

Boston nodded. “You’re ready.”

He led Zepheera all the way up to the attic where there was a small round window easily within reach. The two borrowers sat on the sill, the elder smiling as the child stared at the outside world with open wonder. Boston smiled fondly. His brother’s daughter was growing up so fast.

If only he could be here to see it.

“Which star am I supposed to wish on?” she asked.

Boston shrugged. “I suppose you can just pick one.”

Zepheera turned her gaze up to the twinkling specks of light that dazzled the night sky. She chose one at the tip of a bunch that seemed to take the shape of a fishhook in Zepheera’s mind, and she closed her eyes.

Please take me far away from here.

Prompt: Blood

EEEEVIIIIIL ;o; Why can’t you people just let my characters be happy??

Oh, who am I kidding, they were always meant to be like this ;w;

This is another insight to an otherwise unseen character in my main story. Not an excerpt, just a sneak peek into the tortured past of my OC.

In reference to this list of one-word prompts. Feel free to send me one!

16. Blood

“Come on, slowpoke!” Zepheera hissed over her shoulder. “You almost caught me that time!”

“Sissy-y-y!” whined Kernel as he ran after his big sister, whose name was too complex for the four-year-old to pronounce.

Zepheera simply giggled and carried on jogging through the underbelly of the house. She and her brother played this chasing game almost every time they snuck out of their little home in the walls. And every time Kernel would claim that Zepheera had the unfair
advantage, being much older than him at the age of eleven. But she knew that being able to run well was an important skill for a growing borrower to develop, so she insisted upon the game.

She did, however, try to make it easier for him until he got big enough to be able to contest with her. She ran slower so he could catch her, as well as to give him a fair chance at running away from her. She would dodge and weave around the piles of brick and sawdust left over from when the building was made to improve his motor skills and reflexes.

He’ll be a great borrower someday, she’d think at the end of their games. And I’ll have helped.

A cry of distress behind Zepheera made her skid to a stop and whirl around. Kernel had tripped and fallen hard on the dirty concrete, and his shoulders shook with stifled sobs. Even he, who had been babied by their mother, knew how important it was to keep as quiet as possible, no matter what.

Zepheera rushed to his side and helped him sit up. He had dust all in his strawberry-blond mop, and his buttery eyes shone with tears. His right forearm had been scraped from the elbow to halfway up, seemingly from a sharp rock. Crimson blood stood out starkly against the boy’s fair skin.

Kernel whimpered when Zepheera tried to wipe the blood away without so much as a blink. Her heart hurt when it heard his pain.

“It’s okay, Kern,” she whispered reassuringly, brushing his hair out of his eyes. “It’s only a scrape.”

“S-s-stings,” Kernel sniffled burying his face in his sister’s shirt.

Zepheera wrapped a comforting arm around Kernel’s shoulders, but it took her a minute to figure out why he was so upset. Could it really be that this was his first time getting hurt? Looking back, i wasn’t that impossible. Their mother had made certain that Kernel was safe inside their home. Zepheera supposed that now was as good a time as any to
teach her little brother how to handle pain.

“Well, it won’t for long,” she promised. “Know why?”

Kernel shook his head no.

Zepheera covered the scrape with her hand, eliciting a wince from the boy. “Because in a few seconds, it’ll be gone.”

The boy’s eyes grew large at his sister’s confident assertion. “R-really?”

“You bet,” Zepheera gave him her biggest smile. “Ready? One…two…three!”

The sight of the intact scrape wiped the smile from Zepheera’s face and the wonder from Kernel’s. His shoulders started shaking again, and Zepheera hugged him tighter.

“I-it’s okay,” she insisted. Why didn’t it work? “That’s…that’s normal. I promise.”

Is it just me?

All her life, Zepheera’s wounds would always disappear. Bruises faded within hours, if they ever formed at all, and cuts and scrapes like this were easy-peasy. No one had ever explained to her that that was out of the ordinary. She’d never seen her uncle get hurt, nor her mother, but her mother had certainly seen her heal.

Her mother had been the cause of all her pain in the past.

But for now, Zepheera had to push that aside and get help for her brother.

“C’mon, Kernel,” she cooed, lifting him into her arms as she stood. “Let’s go find Uncle Boston. He’ll know what to do.”

She felt his head shake no against her shoulder. “M-mummy… I want mummy,” he moaned pitifully.

Zepheera let out a long sigh. She’d hoped to delay confronting her mother and stepfather about this for as long as possible. But she couldn’t find it in her heart to say no to Kernel, so she started home.

For a moment, she thought about what she might say to her mother about what happened. ‘It was an accident’, ‘I should have been watching him’; but she quickly realized that it didn’t matter what she said. Nothing would alleviate whatever punishment their mother chose for her. Ever since Kernel had been born, Zepheera’s mother had never laid a hand on her in anger. But now Zepheera was responsible for her baby boy being hurt.

She wondered if, for the first time in three years, she would see blood tonight.

Prompt: Shoulder Angel

As you can tell by the icon, this was prompted about a month ago ^^; Sorry for how late this is, but I finally got around to it! Hope you enjoy! (I assume you meant the episode with van Gogh, cuz I don’t remember an episode with da Vinci)

BTaS Canon: No
Episode: Vincent and the Doctor
Doctor(s): Eleventh Doctor
Companion(s): Zepheera, Amy Pond, Vincent Van Gogh

A shriek split the quiet of the night.

“Amy!” The Doctor jumped up out of his chair and ran out back, Vincent following closely behind.

Meeting Vincent van Gogh had been a bizarre experience, for Zepheera especially. Unlike the Doctor and Amy, she wasn’t allowed to interact with him. The Doctor had insisted on taking precaution when traveling back in time to meet the renowned painter, who had the potential to be unstable or volatile, a potential threat to the four and a half inch tall woman.

She had already been wearing a perception filter attached to a TARDIS key on their visit to the Musée d’Orsay to avoid being seen by the humans there, so she kept it on for their journey back in time. The borrower kept to the Doctor’s shoulder, observing and occasionally whispering in the Doctor’s ear when she couldn’t keep a comment or suggestion to herself. While this allowed her to see the living legend of van Gogh up close and almost personal, it did mean she had to silently endure endless van Gogh puns and flirtatious conversations between the present humans that consisted primarily of remarks about their hair color.

At first, Zepheera wondered if this precaution had been an overreaction. Vincent seemed quite level-headed, albeit eccentric. Once or twice during the initial conversation with her companions and Vincent, the borrower almost thought Vincent was looking right at her. But a second later he’d be looking elsewhere, and Zepheera reminded herself that that was impossible. He was nervous, meeting new people and used to people mocking him. His eyes shifted and jumped around whenever he wasn’t talking to Amy.

On the other hand, after the painter had his evening coffee, he became nearly manic. Not violent necessarily, but he lost all sense of volume control and said whatever came to mind. He had been ranting about colors speaking to him when they all heard Amy scream.

Zepheera flattened herself against the Doctor’s tweed jacket as he rushed into the garden out back, calling Amy’s name repeatedly. They found her in a heap on the ground, breathing hard and looking around frantically.

“What happened?” asked the Doctor, following his human companion’s gaze.

“I dunno, I didn’t see it,” Amy gasped. “I was just having a look at some of the paintings out here when something hit me from behind.”

The Doctor nodded. “It’s okay, it’s gone now. We’re here.”

Suddenly Vincent gave a shout that made Zepheera jump. The Doctor tried to calm him down, raising his own voice to be heard over Vincent’s continued cries. All the noise overwhelmed Zepheera, and she clapped her hands over her ears. This succeeded in dampening the volume a little, but also eliminated any coherency in the massive speech. So she scanned the area to try and figure out what was going on through observation.

Vincent’s eyes were wide, utterly terrified, and he held a defensive hand between him and the Doctor. But he was looking past the Doctor, Zepheera realized. She whirled around, and the sight made her heart race.

“Doctor!” she called desperately as the enormous, horrifying creature before her crept toward the Doctor and Amy. A warning about the monster caught in her throat as the Doctor moved sharply aside, and her hands flew from her ears to grip the jacket again. Her eyes widened even more when she saw that Vincent was charging the beast with some kind of pitchfork.

“Doctor, what’s happening?” Amy demanded.

“I don’t know,” said the Doctor, perplexed and concerned.

Vincent swung the pitchfork toward the creature until it backed into a wall, then bounded off into a more shadowy area of the garden. “Run!” he urged, waving for Amy and the Doctor to get away.

“Yeah, sounds like a good idea,” muttered the Doctor as he carefully approached Vincent. “Amy, get back! He’s having some kind of fit!”

Zepheera, who had lost sight of the creature at the same time as Vincent, stopped searching for it to frown at the Doctor. Had he not seen the monstrous being?

Unless he couldn’t. Borrowers like Zepheera had developed heightened senses of perception over the years; she had seen things that even the Doctor was unable to in the past. For whatever reason, Vincent had to be an exception because he definitely saw the creature.

The Doctor tried to talk Vincent down when the painter held his weapon at the ready, awaiting the creature’s next move. A growl to the right caught Zepheera’s ear, and she turned to find a massive tail preparing to strike the Doctor from behind.

“Doctor, duck left!” The Time Lord glanced to the right, confused when he saw nothing, but he followed Zepheera’s instructions and dodged to the left. He moved about a half second too late and got clipped on his right arm as the tail swung at him, and he was still knocked off-balance. But now he could no longer deny that there was something there.

The Doctor brandished a stick of his own and, with Zepheera’s help, he and Vincent managed to drive the creature away.

“It’s gone, Vincent confirmed.

The Doctor nodded, tossing aside his stick. “Excellent. Good work, Vincent.”

With an eyebrow raised at the Doctor, Vincent said, “You couldn’t see it, could you Doctor?”

“Yes! …Well, okay, no, but–” the Doctor sputtered.

“It’s alright,” Vincent assured, setting down his pitchfork. They started toward Amy, intent on going back inside. “In any case, you’re a lucky man. You might have been hurt were it not for your shoulder angel protecting you.”

The Doctor froze and Zepheera stiffened. “My what?” asked the Doctor.

“Your shoulder angel,” Vincent repeated, smiling at Zepheera. “I’ve been watching her guide you all night.”

Zepheera flushed. He could see me the entire time.

Vincent continued as they walked. “To be honest, she was quite a shock to see. But since I’ve never seen anything like her on the shoulders of the people in this town, and you offered to help me, I chose to take it as a sign. Perhaps your visit will do me some good after all.”

Thanks for the prompt @elitefourstevonnie!

Asks and Prompts are open! | Submissions too!

Zepheera-Vision — I Know That Face

Previously: [1] [2]

After reuniting with Clara, Zepheera opted to ride on her shoulder to avoid further conflict with her Doctors. Her shoulder was slimmer than either of theirs, but as long as she kept still and steady it wasn’t so bad. If she ever moved around too much, there was plenty of Clara’s hair within Zepheera’s reach. A little yank would do Clara less harm than a fall would do the borrower.

It was bizarre for Zepheera to bear witness to the wedding of the Tenth Doctor and Queen Elizabeth I, but it wasn’t nearly as awkward for her as it was for his other incarnations. Clara was enthusiastically supportive, a feeling that Zepheera just couldn’t replicate. She didn’t know that version of the Doctor like Zepheera did.

The second it was over, Ten rushed to his TARDIS and the others followed suit. Zepheera was hit with a pang of nostalgia at the sight of his desktop theme, but with three Doctors in one TARDIS, it didn’t last. The theme kept glitching between their personal versions, finally settling on Eleven’s.

“Right then!” he clapped his hands together. “London Tower, here we come!”

“No!” Clara interjected, making Zepheera flinch in surprise. She tugged on one of Clara’s brown locks to remind the human of her proximity to the noise she made. Biting back a wince, Clara continued in a lower tone.

“UNIT HQ,” she insisted. She’d been there with the Zygons as they took over the facility, using an old Vortex Manipulator to travel back in time to meet up with the Doctors. “They followed us there in the Black Archive.”

All three Doctors stopped what they were doing to turn toward Clara with grave expressions.

“Uh-oh,” Zepheera murmured. “I know that face. Triple that face can’t be good.”

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Stuck in the Middle

BTaS Canon: No
Episode: Day of the Doctor
Doctor(s): Tenth, Eleventh, and War Doctors
Companions: Zepheera

Previously

Zepheera had resigned herself to keep quiet while the two most recent incarnations of the Doctor rode out the novelty of being together with their four and a half inch tall companion. Ten, who hadn’t met Zepheera yet in his timeline, kept trying to surreptitiously learn about what was in store for him and the borrower. She or Eleven, depending on who spoke first, would always answer these types of questions with the word “Spoilers,” and Ten would moan about how the timelines were “too wibbly and I won’t remember anyway!” This only earned him a shrug and elicited a short-lived pout.

Zepheera hadn’t realized how much she had missed that pout.

Eventually the youngest incarnation of the Doctor insisted that they should be making some progress with the whole Zygon-invasion-and-painting-of-Gallifrey problem. The other two conceded and stood in unison. Zepheera got to her feet as well, throwing her single-strapped rucksack over her shoulder.

She turned to find two upturned hands in front of her, both acting as platform for her to climb on. When she looked up, the Doctors were staring each other down.

“Back off, Sandshoes!” hissed the Eleventh Doctor, nudging his counterpart away. “She’s not your companion yet!”

“Exactly! You can spend all the time you like with her, and I wanna know what I have to look forward to! I’m dying for a sneak peek.” Ten exclaimed.

Zepheera bit back a cringe at his phrasing.

Eleven shot back, “You haven’t met her yet. She hasn’t had time to properly train you up.”

“Oh, come on, you know she’s not the first life form her size I’ve encountered!”

“Well it’s different when you live with one, and take it from me who took it from her, you are a shrugger!”

This took the Tenth Doctor aback. He glanced between his future self and his future companion. “I am?” he asked, sounding subdued.

Eleven nodded emphatically. “And a fidgeter.”

“Oh, for God’s sake!” sighed the War Doctor, waiting semi-patiently as the other two squabbled. “You fools are arguing over the lady as though she isn’t here! If anyone’s going to decide who she goes along with, it should be her.”

Ten and Eleven shared a sheepish look and nodded, mumbling apologies to Zepheera. They stood quietly, waiting for the borrower to make her choice.

Zepheera smiled gratefully at the War Doctor, who nodded once in return. He was an enigmatic one, that much was certain, but he seemed just as sweet and caring as the Doctors she knew and loved. She made a mental note to find some time alone with him later, sit down and get to know the Doctor before she knew him.

But for now, she had a decision to make. After a short moment of deliberation, she took a deep breath and approached Eleven. He clapped his hands triumphantly before offering her one to climb onto. Ten sighed but accepted Zepheera’s choice. As Eleven lifted her to his shoulder, she shot Ten an apologetic look.

“You are fidgety. And a shrugger,” she admitted. Ten nodded, barely suppressing a pout at Eleven’s smug look.

A small smirk tugged at Zepheera’s lip. “To your credit, though, you did train up faster than this one.”

Ten snorted and Eleven’s jaw dropped in indignation. “Oh, thanks a lot there, pipsqueak! Let’s just go already.”

“Finally,” muttered the War Doctor.

As they were leaving, Ten crept up behind Eleven and softly asked Zepheera, “How on Earth do you even stay up there with, y’know…” He rubbed his chin, raising a questioning eyebrow at the small woman.

“He slouches,” hissed Zepheera in reply, twisting around to wink conspiratorially at Ten.

“Oh, leave off, you two!” grumbled Eleven.

Ten smirked. “I have a feeling I like you, Zepheera.”

“I should hope so,” she said, facing front again before he could catch the hint of sadness that made it into her smile and eyes.

I’ve missed you.

Asks and Prompts are open! | Submissions too!

Zepheera-Vision — Time and a Crayon

Preface

Zepheera clung to the tweed of the Doctor’s jacket as he fell down a stranger’s chimney. As if to distract herself from the utter terror of free-falling inside a giant man’s pocket, a stray thought floated through the back of the borrower’s mind – At least it’s warm…

And seconds before the Doctor landed, it got very warm indeed. His intrusive body knocked a load of soot loose from the chimney’s shaft, and it all came down on top of the quaint fire burning in the fireplace, quenching it just as the Doctor rolled out and jumped to his feet, coughing and patting away at the black soot that covered him from head to toe.

Somewhere in the landing, Zepheera got dislodged from the Doctor’s coat, and with the security of his hand against her suddenly lost, she flew right out of his pocket onto the newly-blackened floor. She lay there dazed as the Doctor addressed the small crowd of humans – or at least, human-like people. If there was one thing traveling through time and space with an alien taught Zepheera, it was to never make assumptions.

“Ah. Yes! Blimey.” The Doctor’s hand went instantly to his pocket to check on his companion. When there was a distinct lack of a borrower there, he scoured the floor until he found her a few feet to his right. She was just recovering, pulling herself to stand. Satisfied that she was alright, he turned back to the other people in the room. “Sorry. Christmas Eve on a rooftop, saw a chimney, my whole brain just went ‘What the hell’!”

While the Doctor carried on rambling about Father Christmas and Frank Sinatra, Zepheera shook the soot out of her clothes and short, dark hair and assessed the room. There was an old, grouchy-looking man with two men standing behind him; Zepheera guessed they were guards, servants, or both. Then there stood a poor family consisting of what looked like a grandmother, a father, and two children. At least some of them were human, this she knew thanks to the slight ache in the joints of her elbows and ankles that always flared up around when humans were around. In any case, she was much too greatly outnumbered by people who were more than a dozen times her own height.

Tearing her deep violet gaze away from the gathering of giants, Zepheera’s attention was drawn to a large, almost organ-like machine in the corner. She made straight for it, digging her hook and line out of her trusty rucksack. With practiced motion, she tossed it high up and it caught on one of the many flashing buttons. She made short work of climbing up the homemade rope, risking a look over her shoulder halfway up.

The Doctor was doing what he did best, distracting and confounding the humans in the room. Only the children seemed unfazed by his antics, even amused by them. And it didn’t take them long to notice the four and a half inch tall woman dashing across the floor and climbing onto the console. But they kept quiet about her, and Zepheera had to commend them for that.

She hauled herself up and made straight for the center of the console. Some of the buttons and switches were labelled, but nothing directly indicated which one would either shut the whole thing down or coax the skies into saving the ship that Amy and Rory were crashing in. She made an educated guess and pushed down on one of the buttons.

It gave a non-committal buzz, but nothing happened otherwise. She tried again, to no avail.

“Doctor!” she called, hoping he could make sense of this baffling machine.

The Time Lord whirled around and gravitated toward the controls immediately. “Ooh! Now, what’s this then? I love this! Big flashy lighty thing, that’s what brought me here!” He ran his fingers along the buttons around and above Zepheera, teeming with excitement. “Big flashy lighty things have got me written all over them! Not actually. Give me time and a crayon.”

“Do not give him a crayon!” Zepheerea emphasized as the Doctor sat down in the nearby chair and spun it around until his back was facing her. She took the opportunity to jump back onto his shoulder, feeling slightly more confident now that she was in her usual place. Here, the Doctor would make sure that no harm came to her.

As it turned out, the controls reacted to the Doctor in the exact same way. No amount of sonicing the interface would change the fact that Zepheera and the Doctor’s only hope of saving the Ponds was for a very bad man, the only person who could manipulate the controls and the clouds, to suddenly turn nice just in time for Christmas day.

This was all sounding a little…familiar to Zepheera.

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Zepheera-Vision Preface — Time and a Crayon

The chilly, misty night air blew into the TARDIS as the Doctor threw open the doors and stepped out into it. On his shoulder, four and a half inch tall Zepheera hugged herself tightly against the cold, holding in her fleeting body heat.

“So the Ponds are in a cruise-starship crashing toward this planet, and we are on a roof why, exactly?” she griped through gritted teeth in attempt to keep them from chattering.

“There’s something controlling these clouds, preventing that ship from landing. I’d say it was that there,” the Doctor explained, treading carefully across the snowy tile along the rooftop. He pointed up at a large dome further on, connected to a spire shooting a brilliant magenta light into the clouds. “Something on that scale’s gotta have a control hub of some kind, and that’s what the TARDIS was tracking. It’s gotta be around here somewhere.”

Zepheera nestled in closer to the Doctor’s neck to keep warm, glancing around and behind him for an escape ladder or staircase. “We’ve gotta get down from here, first,” she murmured.

As she said this, something caught the Time Lord’s eye. His grin went unseen by the borrower and she was used to him randomly picking up speed as he walked, just as he was doing now.

“Gotta get down and get inside,” he corrected as he approached the smoking chimney stack and braced his hands against the brim. “I say we kill two birds with one stone.”

The Doctor’s sudden stop jostled Zepheera enough to catch her attention, and she turned to take in the chimney and let the Doctor’s plan sink in.

“Don’t you dare,” she warned, “ that is a terrible idea! You could get hurt and I could–Mmph!” Her protests were muffled by the Doctor’s hand scooping her up unexpectedly.

“Oh, c’mon Zepheera, it’s Christmas Eve!” he exulted, dropping her into the pocket on the outside of his coat, the one over his left heart. He cupped a hand gently over it to hold his precious passenger in place. “Hold on tight and have a little holiday spiri-i-i-it!”

With that, he went tumbling down the chimney.

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Zepheera-Vision — I’m So Sorry!

Zepheera’s heart raced as it attempted to crawl out of her throat. She stared wide-eyed at the boot that had nearly crushed her seconds ago.

“Oh, my goodness! I’m so sorry!” an all-too-familiar voice tore through the air from above, and the boot shifted away. Zepheera’s head snapped back to lock eyes with the enormous pair of greens she had waited years to see again.

“I didn’t see you there,” the Doctor continued, entirely flustered and concerned for the borrower at his feet that he clearly didn’t recognize yet. The woman behind him remained silent, looking down at Zepheera with a bemused expression. “Are you hurt? I-I can help! I’m the Doctor.”

“Y-yeah…I know,” Zepheera managed between panicked breaths as they began to slow.

The Doctor frowned, leaning in for a closer look at the four and a half inch tall woman before him. “Zepheera? Is…is that you?”

Zepheera brushed her hair from her face; it had grown out several times since he’d seen her last and was currently shoulder-length. No wonder he didn’t recognize her, he remembered her with short hair. But the violet of her eyes hadn’t changed, and a cautious smile tugged at his lips at the sight of them.

“Hey, old man,” she confirmed. The Doctor’s grin widened until it threatened to overtake his face. “Long time, no see.”

“I…” A sadness crept into the Doctor’s eyes. “I thought I’d lost you.”

Getting to her feet, Zepheera nodded slowly. “Me, too.” She glanced at the woman again and allowed herself a playful smirk. “Looks like you’re doing well for yourself, though.”

His brow shot up. “What? Oh! Yes, right! Zepheera, this is Clara. Clara, meet Zepheera. She travels with me!”

Clara blinked, but smiled politely and said, “Hello.”

Zepheera gave her a wave, but her mind was spinning. After all this time, to hear the Doctor automatically refer to her as someone who travels with him–present tense–was thrilling. She hoped he meant it.

She hoped she could come back and travel with him again.

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Zepheera-Vision — Miss?

Against her better instincts and training, she shrieked at the stark realization of how close she’d come to being flattened. A yelp rang out far above her in return and the human jumped in surprise as Zepheera scrambled to turn back to the shelf. Before she could get far, she was engulfed in darkness and pinned down by something soft and fluffy.

Dazed but unhurt by the impact, it slowly dawned on Zepheera that the human had dropped a box of stuffed animals on top of her, probably a knee-jerk reaction in his shock. Thank goodness it had landed top down rather than dropping straight down. Zepheera definitely wouldn’t have survived that alternative.

Zepheera squirmed and struggled to free herself from her fuzzy prison when the ground shook beneath her and light flooded her senses. The stuffed animal, now noticeably a bear, was lifted away and set aside, revealing a wide set of green eyes that met Zepheera’s startled violets. She heaved an exhausted sigh. Of course, as fate would have it, she’d been seen by John Smith.

Honestly, it could be worse. She’d rather him than a perfect stranger. But he might as well be a stranger to her. Unlike the Doctor, he’d never met anybody less than six inches high.

John stared openly at the tiny woman on the floor, wondering if she was hurt. He wasn’t entirely sure if she was real, but her lack of movement concerned him. It struck him that ‘she’ was actually a highly detailed toy, a doll he hadn’t noticed and that he’d simply imagined had screamed. To be sure, he reached a hand toward her; for a moment he thought he saw her flinch, the tiniest of motions from the tiniest of people, but he’d never find out for certain.

“John?”

The voice pulled John’s attention away from Zepheera as he straightened and turned toward the speaker. She took the opportunity to disappear, dashing toward the shelf closer to the corner she’d seen the cybermat disappear behind.

“Craig!” John exclaimed excitedly, not even questioning why his friend and temporary housemate was there at his work. “You’re never gonna believe this! C’mere! Carefully, though, don’t want to frighten–”

He cut himself short as he looked back to the spot where he’d left the small woman and she was gone. He frowned. “Miss?” he whispered, leaning over the mess of stuffed animals to scan the floor for the tiny, possibly injured person. “Where’d you go? I won’t hurt you, I promise. Cross my heart.” Zepheera risked a peek, freezing when his head and shoulders nearly filled her view.

“Who are you talking to, John?” Craig pressed, bringing the stroller closer.

John glanced back at Craig and Zepheera popped back into hiding. After a moment, she heard John quietly reply, “No one…sorry, must be seeing things.”

“Maybe you need a break,” said Craig, “Let me buy you lunch.” His voice was closer, and a rustling sound could be heard. They must be cleaning up the stuffed animals, she guessed, and soon enough she felt their footsteps rumble away. Once she was sure she was alone, Zepheera made her way toward the end of the shelf. Hopefully that cybermat hadn’t gotten far in all the confusion.

And hopefully, she hadn’t ruined her chances of getting through this with as little drama as possible.

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