Bodysnatchers - Doctor Who

[sushigal007.livejournal.com]

Written for the Second Doctor cliche ficathon for uktechgirl, who wanted "Jamie and Zoe bodyswap." So. They do.

Meanwhile, Zoe had lost sight of the man in green robes and was currently peering hopefully into rooms. Many of them contained strange equipment and machinery that he longed to investigate, but none of them contained the man in green robes.

A door opened next to him and he smiled at the group of men exiting. Apart from a few odd glances at the kilt, none of them gave him a second look. He peered hopefully into the emptying room. No green-robed man.

The room did, however, contain the Doctor. He gave Zoe a cheery wave and jogged over to him. “Ah, Jamie, my lad. Come and meet Deran. He’s been kind enough to give us enough mercury to fix the TARDIS several times over!”

“Er…” Zoe opened and shut his mouth a few times. “Um, och, aye the noo,” he said eventually, with a weak smile in Deran’s direction.

The Doctor looked curiously at him. “Are you all right? Where’s Zoe?”

Zoe looked blankly at him for a second before realising he meant Jamie in her own body. “Oh, aye, och, h-she’s um… ootside.”

The Doctor frowned at him and suddenly grabbed Zoe’s arm and pulled him closer. “Who are you and where’s Jamie,” he hissed dangerously.

Zoe looked away, shamefaced. “It’s me, Zoe.”

“Zoe?!” The Doctor’s mouth dropped open in shock. He stepped backwards, caught sight of Deran watching them curiously and grinned sheepishly at him. “Er, is there somewhere private we could talk?”

Deran shrugged. “There’s no exhibition or class here now, feel free.” The Doctor and Zoe stared silently at him for several seconds before he added, “I’ll be in RF04.”

The Doctor waited until the door had shut before turning and gazing at Zoe. “Oh dear. You really have gotten into a bit of a pickle there, haven’t you? Would I be right in assuming that Jamie is somewhere about, looking like you?”

“It was an accident,” Zoe muttered. “It’ll be easy to fix, I just need to find a man in green robes and I can undo it.”

The Doctor nodded slowly. “Right… very well, you can give me the details while we look for this chap in green.”

He opened the door and looked up and down the corridor before waving for Zoe to join him. As they jogged along, looking through windows, Zoe quickly recounted the story.

“…And then he ran off one way and I decided to try and find the guy who had the helmets,” Zoe finished. “Logically, it would need both of us present to switch us back, but I calculated that Jamie would be a lot easier to find than the-oh!” He stopped suddenly and grabbed the Doctor’s sleeve. “That’s him! That’s the man!” he hissed, gesturing frantically into a large, airy office where the man in green robes was standing, holding a clipboard.

The Doctor pushed the door open and coughed loudly to catch the man’s attention.

It worked. He looked up and smiled. “Hi. Can I help you?”

“I do hope so. You had a machine?” the Doctor asked.

“Two helmets with lights on and a remote,” Zoe elaborated.

He grinned wider. “Oh, you mean the PED? Psyche Exchange Device?” he added as they looked blankly at him. “Brilliant piece of equipment that. It’ll revolutionise diagnostic medicine. I’m Keane, by the way.”

“I’m the Doctor, and this is… er… my friend,” the Doctor replied, pointing to himself and Zoe.

“Is that its purpose then, diagnostics?” Zoe asked in interest.

“Well, that’s one of the possibilities, yes,” Keane confirmed cheerfully. “I mean, you got these idiots who don’t know their arse from their elbow and go to doctors saying, ‘oh, I have a pain in my stomach,’ and you have to sit with them for ages asking if it’s a sharp pain or a dull pain and if it comes and goes or what, only to find out later that they actually the problem isn’t their stomach at all, it’s their chest. With this, the doctor can just switch places with the patient and get all the details first hand!”

There was a moment of silence. “Wow,” the Doctor said eventually. “That sounds… er… like it could be very badly abused, actually.”

Keane laughed. “Oh, it’ll only be given to licensed professionals and used under supervision. It’s got tracking hardware on it so its location can always be traced and if the worst happens and it gets stolen, it can be disabled from a remote location. Don’t worry, it’s heavily guarded. We’re not about to let just anyone play with it, that would be a disaster!”

Zoe flushed scarlet and gazed at his shoes. Jamie’s shoes. “So, where is the PED now?” he asked quickly.

“On its way to Norham,” Keane said cheerfully. “I’ve just put it in the hover-van. It’s going before an ethics committee tomorrow.”

“Oh my!” the Doctor exclaimed in horror. “I mean, we were really, really hoping for a demonstration,” he added hastily as Keane looked curiously at him. “Is there another one around at all?”

Keane shook his head. “Nope. Just that single prototype.”

“Oh dear. That’s a dreadful shame.” The Doctor frowned thoughtfully. “Whereabouts in Norham will this committee be meeting, do you know?”

“The Delphi Hotel,” Keane said obligingly. “There’ll be a demonstration before the committee decides, but it’s only open to members of SMATA. That’s the Scientific, Mechanical and Technical Association.”

The Doctor grinned. “That’s all right then. I’m a doctor of all of those. Well, anyway, you’ve been very helpful,” he said cheerfully, reaching out and shaking Keane’s hand heartily. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Keane held the door open for the duo to leave. “Sorry I couldn’t give you a demo,” he called after them.

“So… now what do we do?” Zoe asked as soon as they were out of earshot.

“Isn’t it logical?” the Doctor asked mildly. “Find Jamie, go to Norham and switch the two of you back. And touch nothing,” he added as an afterthought. “We’ll go see if he’s waiting outside for us.”

===

Jamie was not waiting outside for the Doctor and Zoe. Instead, she’d been dragged kicking and biting to the front of the building, where blue-robed men had handcuffed her and thrown her into the back of a floating car. Now, she was sitting in a dark steel and glass cell, watching her cell-mate, a pretty brunette girl, stare at her. “What?” she snapped eventually.

Her cell-mate looked away, blushing furiously. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to stare.”

Jamie sighed. She was never one to stay mad at girls. Except for Zoe, but that was a special case. “Och, dinnae mind it. I’m used tae it.”

“Well, your clothes are very curious,” the girl said shyly.

Jamie picked a bit of glitter off her arm. “It’s no summat I usually wear,” she said with a grimace. “I’m Jamie, by the way.”

“Kerria.” She shuffled nearer and looked around quickly. “So, what are you in for?”

“I got caught in the Science City,” Jamie said ruefully. “You?”

“Really?!” Kerria looked intrigued. “What’s it like? Is it full of jars of severed heads and robot photons?”

Jamie didn’t have a clue what a robot photon was, but she was pretty sure she hadn’t seen any. “Nah, just a lot of men and machines.”

“Oh.” Kerria’s face fell. “Really? That’s boring.”

“Aye,” Jamie agreed. “What about you?”

“I got caught on my way to a secret school,” she replied. “My husband will not be pleased, I stole his old geography books and now they’ve been taken as evidence.”

The Scot blinked in surprise. “A secret school?”

“I was bored,” Kerria said defensively.

Before either of them could say anything else, a guard appeared at the doorway and unlocked it. “You, come on,” he ordered, pointing at Jamie.

“Good luck,” she whispered to Kerria, and stood up. The guard led her up a flight of grubby stairs and out to the front desk where the Doctor and Zoe were waiting.

“Ah, Jamie,” the Doctor said happily, reaching out and giving her a hearty slap on the back. “Good to see you. Sort of.”

“Am I free to go?” Jamie asked, surprised. Since meeting the Doctor, she’d been held captive many times, but very rarely had she simply been let go.

“As it’s your first offence, you’re being released into the custody of your husband,” the guard said, motioning towards Zoe, who looked like he was trying not to laugh. “You’ll both need to sign these release papers,” he added, pointing to a small pile of paper on the desk.

Jamie picked up a pen and began writing.