Episode 7 – The Hitchhiker

EPISODE VII

The Hitchhiker

 

The Tardis shook hard as it traveled through space time. The Doctor circled the control center a few times, half holding on, half adjusting anything he could. The temporal storm he was stuck in threatened to rip the ship apart.

“Hold on, baby,” the Doctor whispered, steering his ship through the maelstrom. “Hold on.”

Round and round he went, holding on with one hand and tuning, adjusting, and tuning some more the flight controls. Even a ship like the Tardis needed to be well trimmed to get through a storm such as this.

“Almost out…” he said to himself.

With one last violent shake, the Tardis emerged from the storm, but the damaged craft flew awkwardly into normal space time. There was a bounce, a wobble and very large smash as it stopped moving, slamming against something and came to an uneasy rest whereever and whenever the storm had ejected it into normal space.

The Doctor circled around the console again checking the damage reports on the screens. Most of the systems were fine or easily repaired, save transportation.

“Just the important one,” the Doctor mumbled. He circled again checking subsystem diagnostics.

And there, on the floor of the Tardis, was a naked man.

“What?” The Doctor said.

The man groaned.

“What?” The Doctor got closer, but not too close.

The man groaned again, his hand searched for something nearby, an alarm clock, perhaps.

“What?” The Doctor said louder.

“Huh?” the man said, opening his eyes and looking about. He sat up and looked about, then looked about himself.

“What?” the Doctor repeated.

“Where am I? Who are you? And what have you done with my clothes?”

The man stood up. The Doctor raised his hand to, at least in the Doctor’s vision, return the man to some modesty.

“You are on the Tardis, and I don’t know how you got there. I’m the Doctor. Who are you?”

“Arthur Dent,” the man said, extending his hand and approaching the Doctor. The Doctor awkwardly shook his hand, looking upwards.

“Oh right,” Arthur said. “Do you have any…”

“Third door on the right,” The Doctor answered, pointing.

“Thanks.”

 

A few moments later Arthur emerged from the back wearing trousers, suspenders and the long, long length of a scarf wrapped about his body.

“Now this is better than a towel,” he said.

“Hey! Put that back! That was knitted for me by… uh… put it back!”

Arthur looked up at the Doctor. The Doctor pointed back to where he had just come from. Arthur hung his head and walked back.

“But it is rather nice,” he mumbled.

“Who was she? That witty little knitter… why can’t I remember her name?” The Doctor said to himself. His memory was getting worse, not better, he knew. Sami had grounded him somehow. Now that she was gone…

He went to the controls and looked them all over. With the Tardis damaged in the storm, wherever they were, and whenever, they would be here for a bit.

Arthur emerged again.

“Ok, where am I? And why did you bring me here?”Arthur put his hands on his hips to show determination. He had read that somewhere: determined people put their hands on their hips.

“I didn’t bring you here, you just appeared on the floor of my ship. What were you doing?”

Arthur pondered for a moment.

“The last thing I remember was being at some office party. It seemed like it had been going on forever, yet for some reason we kept eating dip. And then I woke up here. Naked.”

“Yes, yes, I remember that part,” the Doctor said.

“So you brought me here,” Arthur said. “And that was particularly rude.”

“I did not bring you here,” the Doctor said. “You just showed up! Wearing nothing, I might add. That is not exactly polite.”

“Well this is spaceship, right? So just take me back and we’ll go our ways.”

“I can’t,” The Doctor said.

“I knew it! You did abduct me!”

“I did not!” the Doctor said. “The Tardis is broken. I’ll need to fix it before we can leave. And I’ll need a few parts.”

The Doctor looked over to the front door. Arthur followed his gaze.

“What’s out there?”

“I don’t know…” the Doctor answered. Which was truth. The damage was causing the Tardis to do both diagnostics and serious self reflection. Both were preventing it from telling the Doctor where they were.

“I guess we’ll have to go look.”

The two walked towards the door. They exchanged looks for a moment before the Doctor opened the door. There was air outside, which was a good start, as well as a floor, maybe even some lights. All good starts, the Doctor thought. All good starts.

“Ok, let’s see what we have,” the Doctor said.

The door lead to a passage, and the passage, presumably, lead to somewhere else. The Doctor decided to find out where and Arthur thought it best to stick with the Doctor even if he was still not sure about him yet.

After a few moments they were gone from the sight, the Tardis let out a sigh.

“So where are we now?” Arthur asked.

“Um, I’d say about 150 meters from where we started,” the Doctor, looking over his shoulder. “Maybe 160…”

“For you. I’m a bit further than that, unless this is the basement of the office building I was in.”

“Somehow I doubt that,” the Doctor said. “This is a space ship. Hm. But I cannot seem to…”

“Vogon”

“… Place the …”

“Vogon”

“… species of origin.”

“Doctor,” Arthur said.

“Yes?
 Arthur had stopped two or so paces behind the Doctor. There was a smaller and mostly unpleasant creature standing in front of him. Unpleasant not to Arthur himself, but rather to the area as a whole.

“Vogon ship,” it said, before wandering off.

“Huh, really?” the Doctor said, and began to think.

The Vogons, as the Doctor remembered, were a race of not very pleasant mostly evolved slugs. They also had a personal affection for proper paperwork more so that the teller at your local motor vehicles department.

“Hm, that was not a Vogon,” the Doctor said, watching the smaller alien waddle off.

“It was not,” another voice said. The two turned and in the hallway, was in fact, a Vogon.

“Ah, this is, in fact, a Vogon,” the Doctor said to Arthur.

“And what do we have here?” the Vogon said, looking at the two human life forms in front of him. “Stowaways?”

“Oh no,” Arthur said before the Doctor could speak. “we just got here.”

“Pirates then,” the Vogon said, pulling out a pistol.

The two men looked at each other. Arthur shrugged.

“This way,” the Vogon said motioning down the hallway.

He lead them down to a small cell not too far away and locked them in.

“I suspect that was the wrong answer,” Arthur said.

“Think so?” the Doctor replied. He was looking at the door. Standard jail cell door, heavy metal with a small window near the top. There was a small door near the bottom, assumingly to provide food.

There was, however, no obvious way to open the door, even with his sonic screwdriver.

“Well I have to admit, it doesn’t seem like you kidnapped me anymore,” Arthur said. “Unless this is a part of your plan.”

“Does this look like I planned this?”

“No, but that too could be a part of your plan,” Arthur said.

“Look, I did not…” the Doctor started. He was cut off, however, but the intercom system.

“As it will take some time to draw up the paperwork for your execution, the captain has volunteered to read you some of his poetry.”

“Oh this should be pleasant,” Arthur said with a smile on his face.

“Did he say execution?” the Doctor asked.

 

Zaphod Beeblebrox had gone to sleep the president of the known galaxy. It was a position that filled his head with such feelings of importance he had been considering lately purchasing a second head to contain all of them.

It was with these thoughts than he awoke to find himself not in his bed, nor the president of anything and yet still considering adding a second head.

“Hello?” he said, looking about.

The collection of men about him had weapons, matching outfits and stern expressions on their faces.

The last thing Zaphod remembered was being in a bar not too far from his presidential mansion. He gave the bartender his new recipe for the strongest drink in the galaxy, the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster. The result of drinking just one of these is the sensation that your head has been bashed in several times and loss of mental and motor functions for more than a few days.

Zaphod had three.

Despite these events, he did remember walking home, upstairs and collapsing in his own bed and still being the president of the galaxy.

“We will ask you again, where is the Heart of Gold?”

The affects of the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster had not completely worn off, and while Zaphod was sure the man had said something, it seemed to be in a language that even his babel fish didn’t understand.

Then again, his babel fish was still under the influence of the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster as well, so it is possible that it did not understand the language.

“It is no use,” another said.

“Agreed, lock him up!”

“Wait, I am in charge here…” Zaphod said as they dragged him away.

 

In their jail cell Arthur and the Doctor lay in the fetal positions, hands over their ears. Their bodies were shivering and most of the color had faded from their faces.

“And before we begin my magnus opus, ‘Contemplations of Belly Button lint’, I want to hear what your thoughts were on my work,” the voice over the intercom said. It was loud, impossibly loud. Shortly after the captain had started to read, the two humanoid prisoners had fallen to their knees, hand over their ears. By the second poem they had begun convulsing, and crying out in pain.

Naturally the captain had turned the intercom up louder so they could still hear him.

“I’m surprised that didn’t cause me to regenerate,” the Doctor mumbled.

“There was a part in the middle I think I kinda liked…” Arthur said.

“Hmm?” was heard over the intercom. “Seems the paperwork is ready.”

The door opened and two guards appeared. They held guns, paperwork and still had earmuffs on.

“Come this way,” one said.

“Huh?” the other said. The two guards looked at each other then quickly removed the ear protection.

“Right, come this way,” they repeated.

The execution room was a few doors down. The chairs were pleasantly comfortable, which was rather odd to the Doctor.

“So, have a plan?” Arthur asked.

“Surprisingly, no,” the Doctor said. “My brain is still under the influence of that poetry.”

The two guards began checking the straps on the chairs were tight about both prisoners.

“Usually I come with a good idea too,” the Doctor said.

“I believe it,” Arthur said. Arthur was nervously tapping his hands against the arm rests. A ring he was wearing made a clinking sound with each tap. The guard looked down at him.

“Sorry…” he mumbled.

“For your crimes, Earthmen, you have been sentenced to…”

“I am not an Earthman, thank you very much,” the Doctor said.

“What?” the guard said, an annoyed look on his face.

“I am a Time Lord. It is not my fault they evolved to look like us,” the Doctor said, nodding his head to Arthur.

“Wait… let me see that paperwork,” Arthur said.

The two guards looked at each other. While it was perfectly legal to show the prisoner the paperwork, none had ever asked to see it.

“Very well,” the guard said, dragging his slimy body near to Arthur.

At first Arthur was unsurprised he could read the document, and went about examining the details. Then he was surprised, considering it was an alien slug creature holding it, but decided to worry about that part later.

“Ah, here, it lists the Doctor’s place of origin as Earth. That is not correct, I suspect you’ll have to fix it before we can proceed,” Arthur said.

“Fix it?” the guard asked.

“Yes, fix it?” the Doctor added.

“Yes,” Arthur said with a bit of authority. “Fix it. One cannot go on with incorrect paperwork. Just think of what would happen if there was a mistake.”

The two guards grumbled to each other for a moment.

“You are right, Earthman,” the guard said. “We will be back.”

“What are you doing?” the Doctor asked as they slimed out of sight.

“I am buying you time to think of something brilliant. That is your part of the bargain, no?”

“Um,” the Doctor said.

When the guard returned, the Doctor had still not yet thought of a brilliant plan. He did admit some tea sounded brilliant, but that was about as far as he had gotten.

“Ok, now that paperwork has been corrected,” the first guard started. “We shall commence with your executions…”

“Let me see,” Arthur said.

“Again?” the Guard asked.

“Of course,” Arthur said. “You cannot expect me to take you at your word, not after such an error before.”

“He has a point,” the second guard said.

The first guard wandered over and showed the paperwork to Arthur.

“You have his first name as ‘The’, you have my place of birth as ‘British’ and for my age have drawn a picture of a fish.”

“It is a good picture, though,” the second guard added.

“It is, but wholly inappropriate for this kind of paperwork. Gentlemen, I’d not want to doubt your abilities, but I happen to have a job on Earth where I spend most of my days filling out paperwork. Perhaps, if you unbound me for a moment, I could fill this out for you.”

“Correctly,” he added.

The two guards considered the offer for a moment.

“It would look bad to go back for more corrections,” the first said.

“Especially after that three day training session we avoided last week,” the second added.

“Very well,” the guard said to Arthur. “But be fast, the higher ups have us on this schedule…”

“Oh don’t I know that,” Arthur said as he was released. “They always want things now! You would think they didn’t understand how complicated some aspects of your job are.”

“Exactly!”

The Doctor watched with a pleasant amazement as the guard lead Arthur to a nearby table and handed him two fresh pages to work on. After a few moments of chatting about management and what not, Arthur sent the guards on their way.

As they left he went to the Doctor and began pulling at the straps on his arms.

“That was quite brilliant,” the Doctor said. “I would have been proud to think that one up.”

“Who would have thought ten years of mind numbing bureaucratic work would be worth something?”

The Doctor’s legs were still bound when the guards returned. He put his arms back where they belonged and sat still. Arthur made his way around the other side of the room, pretending to be quite interested in some cracks on the wall.

“Ah, good, let’s take one last look, and we can get to the execution, no?”

The guard handed Arthur the paperwork. He looked it over, once, twice, and got a very concerned look on his face.

“This isn’t right, this isn’t right at all!” he said. “Do they not even read what we write?”

“What is it this time?” the guard said a most frustrated tone in his voice.

“Why this says YOU two are to be executed, and that we are to be freed. Seriously, do they hire Vogon that failed grade school to work down there?”

“Us?” the second guard said.

“We are to be…” the first mumbled.

“Gentlemen. We all know that is not the case. Obviously we are the prisoners and you are the guards. I need you both to march down to that office, ask for… no, demand to see the manager and when he shows up demand to see his. Tell them that sloppy paperwork like this is to not be tolerated.”

“But it says…”

“… we are to be…”

“Yes, it does, which is wrong. Go fix it, quickly before someone who is less thorough about their paperwork comes along and tries to follow these orders.”

Now Vogon, being decedents of very large sea slugs of sorts have never been know for being fast. In fact during their version of Olympic games, it is quite common for the crowd to take a nap durning the 100 meter dash. These two Vogon, however, were quite motivated and slid and slugged down the hallway with great earnest.

“Now that,” the Doctor said when they were gone. “Was brilliant.”

“Switch two names on a single piece of paper and it means something totally different.”

Now both free of their bonds, the two looked out into the hallway of the space ship. For now the coast was clear and they started to head back out.

There was a computer terminal nearby and the Doctor started playing with the keys and such looking about the screen for some useful information.

“Excellent,” the Doctor said after a moment. “Seems we are in orbit around a planet. We can go there.”

“Wait,” Arthur said. “I thought you said the Tardersauce was broken and we couldn’t leave?”

“Tardis,” the Doctor corrected. “Trans… uh… something… Dimensional…”

Again with the memories. The Doctor paused, this was something he should really remember.

“Tardis,” he repeated. “And we are close enough that I think we can make it.”

“Think?” Arthur said, incredulously. The two began walking a bit swiftly back to the small blue box.

“I do most of the time,” the Doctor said. “And I don’t think you want to spend the rest of your days here filling out Vogon paperwork.”

“Well, I do seem to be rather good at it…” Arthur said.

The Doctor glanced over his shoulder as he unlocked the front door of the Tardis. He grabbed Arthur’s shoulder and pushed him inside and closed the door, and quickly closed it behind him.

There were the sounds of weapons fire of some sort against the door.

“What was that?” Arthur asked.

“Weapons fire of some sort,” the Doctor said. He was again circling the controls of the Tardis looking at the monitors.

“Ok girl, we just need to get to the planet, just a few hundred thousand kilometers away. You can do it.”

The Doctor pulled the lever.

 

Zaphod was being lead across the grand hallway of his palace at that moment. The two guards at his back had been ignoring the mostly incoherent things the man had been saying and definetly not listening to the orders to release him.

“Look,” Zaphod said, not turning around. Such an action would cause his head to spin. “I am in charge here, you should let me go.”

At that moment the Tardis rematerialized in the room. However it did not materialize on the ground as it had for the predominate number of times it had materialized. It appeared several meters above the ground.

Right over the two guards.

The sound of a spaceship disguised as a large blue box falling from even a relatively low height is particularly loud. Even more so if you are still feeling the effects of a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster.

“Ow!” Zaphod said. He then turned around to scold the guards in matching outfits who were not listening to him and instead found himself facing an out of place blue box with a man emerging.

The man was wearing a sweater vest, holding some gizmo of sorts and looked a bit shaken.

“Who are you?” Zaphod said.

“The Doctor,” he said, looking down at his gizmo as it scanned Zaphod.

“Oh good, I can feel a hangover coming…”

“Yes,” the Doctor said getting a smell of Zaphod’s breath. “But I am not that kind of Doctor.”

He stepped out and scanned the room. Arthur followed looking about, and then down.

“You landed on someone!” Arthur said.

“They weren’t very pleasant,” Zaphod said. “Even in matching outfits.”

The Doctor stopped his scanning to look over. There were only limbs sticking out from under the craft, but the uniforms looked familiar.

“Keeper,” he said.

His gizmo beeped.

“What?” Zaphod said.

“Who?” Arthur asked.

“The Bad Guy,” the Doctor said. His gizmo beeped again and he raised it. The man named Zaphod seemed to be the reason.

“Have you been near something really high tech lately? Like a spaceship part?”

“You are looking for the Heart of Gold too?”

“The what?”

“You sure you can’t help my head?” Zaphod asked.

“Heart of Gold,” the Doctor repeated.

Zaphod sighed.

“It is a super secret spacecraft. New never before used engines and whatnot. I was going to steal it during the unveiling in a few weeks. But then these soldiers showed up.”

The Doctor looked at his gizmo again. Arthur had come up behind him.

“What’s that?” he asked. The Doctor glanced over his shoulder.

“Its… its… complicated, ok?” the Doctor turned back to Zaphod. “Where is this Heart of Gold?”

“So you can take it?”

“Whatever this ship is, it is out of place. And if the Keeper wants it, I need to get to it first.”

Zaphod looked at Arthur. Arthur shrugged.

“This way,” Zaphod said. “I think…”

“I’m Arthur, Arthur Dent,” Arthur said.

“Hi ArthurArthurDent, Zaphod Beeblebrox, president of the Galaxy.”

“Beeblebrox?” the Doctor mumbled to himself.

“Like president of the whole galaxy?” Arthur asked.

“The whole thing,” Zaphod said.

“Beeblebrox?” the Doctor said again.

“No doubt you are stunned to be around me,” Zaphod said.

“No, that isn’t it. Just seems I would have heard of you, a man of your position. And, well, I can’t say that I have.”

Zaphod stopped and looked at the Doctor.

“Never?”

The Doctor shook his head. Zaphod looked at Arthur who too shook his head.

“Well, that is highly unusual. Maybe you are from Dadalle Frax? They call me something else their since they see me as their deity?”

“No, though I’ve never been there either,” the Doctor said. “I think.” He added.

“I am a paper pusher for a large cooperation. Sometimes I don’t even know my boss’s name.”

Zaphod shook his head and began walking again. This was certainly something new: not one but TWO people who had never heard of him. What next? Time machines?

“Ok,” Zaphod said as they reached a certain uninteresting part of the wall. “This is the most interesting part of my wall,” Zaphod said.

“Certainly doesn’t look it,” Arthur said.

Zaphod swiped his hand over the wall and a door opened.

“Hm, ok, that is interesting.”

“Now,” Zaphod said, swiping his hand again and closing the door. “This is my secret passage, only encoded to my genes, so before we go anywhere else, we are going to get a drink.”

The Doctor regarded Zaphod for a moment before pulling out his sonic screwdriver. The lock was high technology for sure, but the door was rather primitive for the time. He used the screwdriver on the hinges and after a second or two it fell backwards into the wall.

“Or not,” Zaphod said.

“I want one of those,” Arthur said, eyeing the sonic screwdriver.

“No,” the Doctor said.

He walked into the passageway, Arthur followed behind.

“I know I was in charge when I went to sleep last night,” Zaphod said before following himself. “Of everything.”

 

After a few moments the Tardis let out another sigh.

“That’s ok,” it said in a melancholy voice. “Leave me here. I’ll wait. I always do.”

 

At the end of a short tunnel the Doctor found a levitating vehicle. It was round mostly with a pilot seat and long round bench for five or so others.

“I like to bring ladies here, take them on a personal tour of the Heart of Gold,” Zaphod said. “Then we go see that ship.”

He had a look of pride on his face as he took a step forward and fell face first into the skimmer. Thankfully he missed all the soft parts of the bench and fell to the harder floor.

“Ow,” he said, pulling himself up onto the bench.

The Doctor got behind the controls and after a few seconds got the craft moving forward.

“I think the affects of whatever drugs they had him on are wearing out,” Arthur said. Arthur watched from the Doctor’s side as he controlled the craft.

“And I think he did that to himself,” the Doctor commented.

“I had help!” Zaphod corrected.

The craft sped along the tunnel coming out into the sunlight after a few moments. Only it wasn’t sunlight, it was large overhead lights the Doctor realized. This must be the hangar bay.

“Ok, now to find out what it is the Keeper wants with this Heart of Gold.”

The three hopped out of the craft and began walking towards it. The Doctor used his gizmo to scan the craft.

“What’s that?” Arthur asked.

“I told you,” the Doctor said.

“Yes, yes, complicated. I mean that,” Arthur said, pointing. There was a highlighted part of the ship.

“Something out of place,” the Doctor said, stuffing the gizmo back in his coat pocket.

Zaphod’s head began to hurt more so than it should simply because he fell on it. Still he followed this Doctor character around. Whoever he was he certainly acted as if he were more important than the president of the entire galaxy.

Which was non-sense.

“This is non-sense,” the Doctor said. He had stopped at a table of pamphlets in front of the huge golden colored ship. They were press releases for the craft.

“Infinite improbability drive?” the Doctor continued. “Sounds like a randomizer with a HAP battery attached.”

“HAP?” Arthur asked.

“‘Hope and a Prayer’,” the Doctor said. “They aren’t used much anymore. After using one you tend to lose the ‘hope’ part.”

“No matter, they can’t get it working,” Zaphod said. “It is why I haven’t stolen it yet.”

“President of the galaxy and you are going to steal a spaceship?” Arthur asked. “Isn’t that out of character?”

“You really have no clue who I am, do you?” Zaphod said, holding the side of his head. This was truly perplexing.

“Let’s go have a look,” the Doctor said walking up to the space ship.

“You have to get scanned to get in, and I am not scanning it until you…” Zaphod started.

The Doctor pulled out his sonic screwdriver and within a few seconds opened the front door. Really these builders needed a quick lesson on security doors.

“Ok, what is that thing and how do I get one?” Zaphod said, pointing.

“It’s just a screwdriver,” the Doctor said before entering the ship.

“Sound based, if you were to ask me,” Arthur said. “Not that anyone does.”

“Now this is a nice space ship,” the Doctor said.

Arthur had only really seen two spaceships at this point in his life, but had to admit this was a nice one.

“Is it cold in here?” Zaphod asked.

“No, not really,” Arthur said looking at Zaphod. The man was shivering, but there was a line of sweat along his forehead.

“I think it is cold,” Zaphod said, his arms wrapped about himself. This was in addition to his head increasing in pain.

“Engine room is down this way” the Doctor said.

“How do you know?” Arthur asked.

“Because I would have put it the other way,” the Doctor answered.

The three headed down the hallway to the door at the end. The Doctor stared to use his screwdriver, thought for a minute.

“Ship, could you open this door for me?” the Doctor said.

“I would be delighted, sir!” the Ship said and opened up. “I hope you enjoy walking through me.”

“Thank you!”

“Ugh, I hate those things,” Zaphod said. “Always so cheerful.”

The engine room was nice and new like the rest of the ship, but it was not yet finished. Parts of the walls were still open, wires were strung about the room. In the center a large pedestal had a golden box sitting on it where all the wires and computers and connections were heading towards.

“So here it is,” the Doctor said. “Infinite improbability drive…”

“More like finite probably of failure,” Zaphod mumbled. He was leaning against the wall, one hand on his head still.

“Hmm, so use probably to move a ship to anywhere in space instantaneously…” the Doctor mumbled, playing with the sides of the box.

“Instantaneously, that sounds impossible, you have to move to travel,” Arthur said.

“Brilliant,” the Doctor said, looking at Arhur.

“Uh, huh?”

“Look the drive works on improbability, yes? It takes the infinite number of finite probably to create a field to travel to travel in. The problem these so called scientists were having is that they could only create a finite number of probabilities, no matter how smart they were.”

“Well isn’t that impossible?” Arthur asked.

“Not impossible, just improbable…” the Doctor commented, and began to type on a nearby console.

“There is, in fact, a finite probability that you could never find an infinite number of solutions…”

“And that number…”

“Is the final piece of the puzzle.”

The Doctor triumphantly pressed the last few buttons in his sequence.

“He knew you would figure it out.” a new voice said into the room.

Arthur turned and looked at the man behind them with the gun. Zaphod raised his eyes through his painful head at the two others with guns that had now joined them.

The Doctor did not look up. He had known as well. Instead he pushed three last buttons.

“Naturally you will come without resisting,” the guard said.

“Naturally,” the Doctor said. And turned and walked back the way they had come.

 

“Does this happen to you a lot?” Arthur asked. “I do confess we have only briefly known each other but this is the second time in that brief time I have found my self, with you of course, inside of a jail cell.”

“Ow…” Zaphod mumbled. He was, at this point, sitting on the floor, resting against the wall, his head in between his knees. “OW!”

“I do admit, it seems to be a trend lately, getting put in a jail cell that is,” the Doctor said to Arthur.

“I suppose I’ll be filling out the paperwork again this time,” Arthur said, crossing his arms. One he had read that people who cross their arms are pouting and shouldn’t do that sort of thing. Still at this moment he didn’t care.

“No, this time I have a plan,” the Doctor said, a devious smile about his face.

Zaphod was breathing heavily now. He let out a scream that got everyone’s attention.

“WHAT IS THIS FEELING?” he yelled.

“I think it is called sobriety,” the Doctor replied.

“IT’S AWEFUL! MAKE IT STOP!” Zaphod replied.

The Doctor shook his head, smiling. He walked over to Zaphod, pulling out his sonic screwdriver. He put it on a low, low setting, and ran it along the base of Zaphod’s scull.

“There, the sound show alleviate some of the stress to your muscles, causing blood flow.”

“It helped, thanks” Zaphod said.

“Funny, they didn’t take that,” Arthur said, looking over.

“Well, it won’t open the door,” the Doctor said. “Not this one at least.”

“Yes, but how did they know that?”

The Doctor paused. The guy did have a point. He would need to consider it later.

“Later, Arthur. Now is the time for the plan.”

“Now?”

The alarms went off in the building. Outside of the jail cell they trio could see and hear guards running from the jail part.

“Wonder what is going on?” Arthur asked. Zaphod had stood and was looked out of the bars as well.

“You think with someone as important as me in here they would ignore the alarms and keep an eye on me,” Zaphod said. Arthur looked at him.

“You know,” he continued. “To keep me safe from you two.”

The Doctor, however, was simply laughing quietly.

“Care to explain?” Arthur asked, catching the Doctor close his hand suddenly.

“Well, they are running because the Heart of Gold, quite unexpectedly, fired up her engines and disappeared…”

“Where did that ship go? I still need to steal it!” Zaphod said.

“Oh, to this very jail cell,” the Doctor said.

“We will be killed, there isn’t that kind of room in here!” Arthur interrupted.

“Only now it is of a size it could be swallowed by a barking dog,” the Doctor said, and opened his hand. There in the center was floating a centimeter or so above his palm was a very miniaturized Heart of Gold.

“That’s… That’s…”

“Highly improbable?” the Doctor said with a smirk.

“Computer, please use your lasers to break the door lock. I believe 30% should be adequate.”

“Of course!” the Ship said to the Doctor. “Glad to help!”

The now very small Heart of Gold flew off of the Doctor’s hand and over to the lock mechanism. After a few blasts the door clinked and opened.

“I suspect they will be coming soon. The Keeper will put me as #1 on his list of the missing space ship. May I suggest we retire to the Tardis for some tea?”

“Now that sounds like a good idea,” Arthur said.

 

A few moments of sneaking about corridors lead the trio to the blue box spaceship in Zaphod’s mansion.

“It is bigger on the inside,” Arthur said.

“I get to say that,” the Doctor quipped as he opened the door.

Still, Zaphod looked in surprise about the interior

The Doctor took the still mini Heart of Gold over to the central controls of the Tardis.

“Ok, computer. We are going to interface your drive system with the Tardis for a bit since she is still self repairing.”

“Sounds fantastic!” the Ship said. “I suspect we will be best of friends!”

The Tardis, who could not be heard by the trio due to the sudden introduction of weapons fire outside, sighed.

“Oh, sounds like they found us,” the Doctor said, getting the final few wires in place.

“Should we do something?” Arthur asked.

“Oh know, those doors are pretty solid. The hordes of Ghengis Khan couldn’t get through them… Though that was a horrible misunderstanding and we had dinner a few nights later.”

The controls of the Tardis lit back up to their normal brilliance. A smile formed on the time lord’s face as he went to them.

“Ok, now!” he said. “Let’s get you out of here, shall we?”

 

The party was still going on when the blue box appeared tucked in one of the corners of the room. Arthur’s heart sunk a bit when he saw them bringing more dip out to the table.

“I feel like we have been doing this for weeks…” he mumbled.

“Oh, a wet bar!” Zaphod said, pushing past the two others and into the party.

Arthur looked back at the Doctor.

“Why are you leaving him with me?” Arthur asked. He watched as Zaphod sauntered over to a girl he had been talking too and quickly struck up a conversation.

“Hey!” Arthur said. “I was going to… She was … I have almost asked for her phone number!”

Arthur wandered back into the party.

The Doctor simply smiled and waved, the blue box disappearing a few moments later.