Debbie had never actually been inside of Webbi’s room before but she was sure that it should be a lot different to this. Ever since her arachnid body-borrowing friend had ended up trapped inside her current body things had been a bit tense and strained. Now though Webbi seemed to be opening up more and more to her. Of course her friend’s less savoury aspects had never once shocked her, even the Doctor hadn’t stuck around when Webbi was eating. However being a reconstructed zombie-esque person meant that Debbie didn’t concern herself with more mundane things like Webbi pumping an animal full of digestive juices and then draining the creature dry an hour later. She even helped to hold the animals still for Webbi, but now Webbi had to rely on her host’s digestive system.
Debbie was sure the room was tasteful decorated, there seemed to be a lot of pink which she remembered liking when she was still alive. Plus there were cushions, courtesy of the Doctor, which seemed important to Webbi’s comfort and frame of mind.
“Thanks for coming here.” Webbi said to Debbie in a hushed voice. “I’ve got a few problems with this body. I can’t get this hair to work properly. It was fine when I first borrowed it but now it won’t go right and I keep thinking about split ends. Is this body dying Debbie? You can tell me, the Doctor would just give me a speech about age and acceptance. I need the truth Debbie.”
Debbie sat down next to her confused and upset friend. “When I was still alive I had problems with my hair too. Every day I would have to wash it with lots of herbal shampoos and soften it with conditioners. I think you will have to do the same wit this hair. It is very brittle, you should tend to it at once.”


The Doctor was sitting alone in the darkness of the console room, glaring at the console and cradling her left hand. “I don’t care what you think, I am your mistress, I command the roads of eternity and I say where and when we travel down them to. I am the Doctor, I am the champion of the oppressed and the needy, I am what Daleks have bad dreams about!”
The console bleeped defiantly.
“Your opinion is irrelevant, I am the Doctor now, you have to accept me. Billions will die if you do not.” The Doctor walked over to the console. “We have to make the best of a bad situation. You do not trust me yet and I do not trust technology yet. I come from a dimension where magic was real, I called forth Excalibur from the bones of the dragon of the world, I breathed the breath of the dragon through my whole being and now I’m stuck here with a couple of preening bimbo’s and a ship that does not go anywhere.”
The console bleeped again and the room was bathed in light once more.
“Good, now tell me, have we ever been to the planet Ikzvarn before? I saw in the databanks that it is run by a most corrupt and tyrannical regime. I think my other self was going to pop by and have a pot of tea there and see if she could overthrow that cesspit of vipers before her third cup. I may as well continue her work.” The Doctor began to input the flight co-ordinates. “I’ve never been overly fond of tea before but I guess I can give it a try.”


The TARDIS materialised with all the grace and charm of an angry elephant flickering in and out of reality. It stood on a rocky outcrop with little but reddish sand and the occasional limp-looking plant around for colour.
Out of the TARDIS stepped three women, then one rushed back inside and remerged without the towel around her head and carrying a battery powered hairdryer and a brush in her hands.
The Doctor looked at her companions for a second and wondered if some sort of part exchange scheme was possible. She might be able to trade them in for something a little more useful like a brick.
Debbie held up a mirror for Webbi to preen herself with as she continued drying her hair as they walked. “How is your hair now?”
“Much better, it’s all soft and bendy now.” Webbi was uncertain of advanced human hair design and settled for putting lots of pretty silk ribbons in her hair once it was dried.
“Good, now put that stuff away, we don’t want people getting suspicious of us. This culture is not very advanced and if they find us with battery powered hairdryers they might lock us up in prison.”
“You always like that part of the adventure.” Debbie reminded the Doctor.
“Normally yes, but this time we need to be on the outside of the gaol from the start. Now where is that teashop again? We need to sit around and drink lots of tea”
“Like we don’t do that a lot.” Webbi joked wryly.
“Do you have a complaint?” The Doctor asked sharply.”
“No.” Webbi replied meekly. “It was just a joke, I love tea and biscuits and crushed maggot cake.”
“Good, normally I like a good jest but this is deadly serious work, if we get caught they will execute us.”
“So I’m ok then.” Debbie said casually. “I will miss both of you though, as much as I can. I will be glad to share death with you both, for me it has been enlightened by your presence.”
“We’re not going to die yet.” The Doctor said to Webbi who seemed on the verge of tears. “I don’t have any more lives left and you’ve still got so much of the universe to see. Maybe we can even fix your host body, get you separated from her and I can make you a cream cake filled with ant flavour jam.”


The city, nominally called a city because it had a badly repaired wall surrounding it and it had been called a city for so long now than no one remembered why it had been called a city in the first place. Inside the bleached walls lay a random scattering of stone houses and many more canvas tents. Every few feet there was a fire each with ten or so people huddled around it for warmth as the lengthening shadows of evening approached. By nightfall there would be twice as many people crowded around each fire, it was a safety inspector’s worst nightmare and a television reporter’s fantasy news item waiting to happen.
The three women entered the city though one of the larger gaps in the wall and they made their way through twisting streets of fabric and stone towards the faint aroma of teabags.
“This way.” The Doctor pointed down a dark and sinister looking alley.
“No way.” Webbi replied instantly.
“It’s ok.” Debbie soothed her frightened friend. “You can hold my hand.”
“Not another Haana.” The Doctor muttered to herself before setting off towards the scent of tea.
“Who’s Haana?” Debbie asked Webbi.
“No idea.” Webbi replied.
“Hi there. I’m Haana.” Haana said to the pretty women before wandering off again with Claire and Geokai in tow.
“Oh, well she seemed very nice.” Webbi said to Debbie. “That bottom touching ritual seemed very sociable.”
“I know.” Debbie replied. “It was very popular on my planet too, until the Bliss almost wiped half the population of my planet out trying to renew itself.”
“Will you two come on?” The Doctor grabbed her nearly useless friends by their wrists and dragged them down the badly lit ‘street’ towards the teashop.


Overhead the Tyrant’s dirigible floated over the city and his unholy taxmen flew down to set up the force shield to prevent any of the wealthy citizens escaping with their money.


Inside the tearoom the Doctor poured the drinks, as she didn’t trust either of them when it came to spillage of hot liquids. Besides it was nice to be mother for a while and not a cosmic gym mistress in a galactic game of netball with the safety and security of the universe as the trophy for the winner.
“I’m not sure I like tea.” Webbi complained to the Doctor. “I keep thinking it should have bird’s blood in it but my host body hates that, I think I’m having a crisis of opposing belief systems.”
“Read from the cue cards.” The Doctor hissed loudly in a quiet voice. “You have to read your lines out from the cards.”
Debbie looked at here cards. “Gee Doc…”
“Don’t call me Doc.” The Doctor replied curtly on cue.
“Ok, Doctor, whatever can we three poor women who are all very wealthy and unmarried do about the evil regime of the over tax…tax…what does this word say?”
“Taxed populace. Well here’s what we can do. We can band together into a union and all refuse to pay any more of these ridiculous taxes.”
“I think I’m going to be sick.” Webbi retched and collapsed onto the floor.
“What can we do?” Debbie asked the Doctor.
“Read her lines for her you ninny.” The Doctor snapped. “If we screw up now then millions of people could die.”
“We couldn’t we just go to this tyrant’s palace and you could give him a stern lecture on being kind to people and they would lock us up, then we could escape and run up and down a lot of corridors before defeating the tyrant in a small duel of wits while there’s a large off-screen battle elsewhere. It’s always worked in the past.”
“Maybe, but I’ve got a different way of doing things now.” The Doctor wondered how much her companion suspected. That pink metal dog had suspected too much and it had to be put down, she would regret losing another friend so quickly. She dipped into the inside pocket of her jacket and pulled out a bag of sweets. “Would you like a lollipop?”
“I do not eat food.” Debbie replied. “However I can hold one and pretend to eat it if it will make you fell better.”
“Do you want a lollipop Webbi?”
Webbi groaned sadly and tried to shake her head but failed miserably.
“We should get her back to the TARDIS Doctor.” Debbie said urgently. “I think she may be dying.”
“What is one life compared to billions?” The Doctor asked. “Would you notice one star out of billions stopped shining? Would you notice if all the stars stopped shining? We cannot hope to balance out the deaths of so many against the life of one person, no matter how dear they are to us.”
“I may be dead Doctor, but I know what it is to be a good person.” Debbie threw the stupid cards away and picked up Webbi’s inert body. “Come on, I’ll carry you back to the ship. We’ll let it fix you up as best it can.”
Webbi tried to voice her thanks but instead was sick down Debbie’s back.
The Doctor looked about the room, suddenly the shadows seemed a lot darker and bigger than before and the air seemed full of the scent of danger and a lot less herbal than before. “I’d better supervise Debbie, nice girl but not very bright.” She walked quicker and quicker out of the shop and by the time she was outside the shop she was running flat out, well as flat out as a woman can get in three inch heels and she doesn’t want to break anything in the most embarrassing and painful manner possible.


The Taxmen spiralled down on the city using personal rocket-powered backpacks to swoop down like eagles on their prey. They began to set up a high-powered laseron defence screen so that no one could escape the taxation.


“Wait up!” The Doctor’s shoes clicked loudly on the dirty stone slabs as she ran after her two companions. “They’ll have the laseron defence screen up now, without my sonic screwdriver you won’t be able to get past it.”
“Halt citizens!” A Taxman swooped over to where the three strange women were slowly backing away from in a strong defensive formation. “You must pay the exit tax if you wish to leave the city.”
“We don’t have time for this.” Debbie said to the Doctor. “Webbi needs immediate medical attention.”
Webbi tried her best to help her chums. “Aim me at him, I can be sick all over him.”
“It’s ok.” The Doctor replied. “I know how to deal with these odious buffoons.”
“Halt citizens.”
The Doctor rummaged through her jacket pockets and pulled out her leather purse with the large seal of Rassilon on the front of it. “Ah yes, it’s been a while since I had to pay. Bobby, bless his tight fitting t-shirts, would insist on not paying for me.” She opened the purse and a small bat with red skin and green fur tried to fly out of it. “Oh no you don’t.” The Doctor pushed the bat back into its compartment. “That’s worth half a kingdom on the planet Sylvania you know. I was saving it for Bobby, in case he accidentally fell in love with the princess there but it wasn’t to be. Ah now Flannian pobble beads? I’ve got three ningi’s in orbit around your planet. They’re those large triangular patches in the sky, very large for such fiddly small change don’t you think?” The Doctor found an emergency lipstick in her purse and let Webbi use it, well because. “Ah yes, three vials of diamadmium, highly toxic to all life forms and very explosive too. Look what we have here…now is this spray on gold?” The Doctor shook the small canister up a little before squirting it in the eyes of the taxman. “Ooops, silly me, this is my can of mace. Come on you two, lets get out of here.”
“Hold it right there!” Two more Taxmen, one male, one female, entered the plaza, guns held at the Doctor.
“Hello there.” An elfin figure appeared from the shadows and started to kiss the female with liberal intent.
“Hey, it’s Haana.” Webbi managed to say weakly.
“Who?” The Doctor asked Debbie.
“Your former companion, your most infamous friend ever. Or is the word notorious? Certainly she’s the gayest friend you’ve ever known, not in the biblical sense at least that I know of but hey I’m not judging your lifestyle choices.”
“Is she removing that woman’s clothing?” The Doctor asked Debbie as she accidentally hit the male soldier on the head with her handbag.
“I think she’s using the kiss and capture technique.” Debbie guessed wildly. “She’s using her feminine wiles to ensnare the confused and rather butch woman before trying her up. I thought you would have remembered more about your protégé’s work myself. In a way she’s a part of you, she has about half of your DNA inside of her.”
“I say, isn’t that sexual assault? The Doctor asked the others. Shouldn’t I be saving that woman from my friend or something?”
“She has to take the bra off to tie her hands up with. Stops her shooting us with her gun you see.”
“I’m seeing far too much as it is thank you very much. I just hope she’s not going to try and tie that women’s feet together, otherwise I’ll have to say something.” The Doctor just had to look away from the scene altogether.
“There we go.” Haana smiled to herself. “In under thirty seconds too, a new personal best I think. I think we can leave her legs kicking, it’s not like I’m trying to shock people for kicks.”
“Do you do this sort of thing often?” The Doctor tried to be polite and ignore her companion’s homosexual handiwork.
“No, not really, well not so much these days. Claire only wants me to look at her you see. I just wanted to impress you in front of Geokai. She’s the quiet one hiding behind that wall. She’s very shy; she’s a big fan of yours you see. If you could sign a few tings of hers later on she would be most grateful and her brother Leokai, who got stuck writing our homework assignments again, would be so jealous.”
“Err…Right.” The Doctor didn’t know what to say. “You really shouldn’t stick around here, Haana is it? It’s going to get a lot more dangerous. You should get away while you can. We’re going anyway and I wouldn’t want you to get hurt either. Why don’t you go somewhere safer now, run along, shoo, scram.”
“Oh, ok.” Haana wasn’t sure what was up with the Doctor. She seemed much less her usual self and much, much less comfortable than she could ever be. Maybe she had a migraine? One of those painful bastards you get behind the eyes and refuses to shift no matter how many non-aspirin painkillers you take for it? “We’ll get out of your hair then Doctor, just one more thing, our goodbye kiss. I know it’s been a while and I turned you down but we can still be friends ok? There’s nothing wrong with just a kiss is there?”
The Doctor shivered, shuddered, shivered again and wanted to run away, say to the next galaxy. “Kiss? You mean me and you?”
“We only slept together for three years but yeah, me and you.” Haana held the Doctor’s hands. “Can we just be friends?”
The Doctor just wanted to get rid of the girl, no questions asked and then she could have a cold shower with a scrubbing brush and strong detergent. “Ok, a kiss for old times sake.”
Haana fake smile turned into an accusing glare. “The Doctor was straight, I don’t know who you are but you’re not her. You had better prepare for a serious ass kicking…”
“I am the Doctor.” The Doctor snapped back. “I’m from a parallel dimension, I followed Morgaine here to kill her. I had to step into her shoes when she died; I have to fulfil her legacy. You see only I can replace her, me. We are the same Time Lady, I am the Doctor whether you believe it or not!”
“Do I look like Ripley?” Haana asked. “Still let me check something.” She checked the impostor’s pulse, both of them. “Ok so you’re from Gallifrey, or Centauri Prime, or Interfrastica Minor, maybe even Deretikor Seven if you changed your skin colour and developed a feminine physique.”
“Look, we don’t have time for this.” The Doctor snarled. “Shut up and get the frell out of here or you, your whatever and the shy girl over there, who’s currently making plaster casts of my footprints, are all going to die.” The Doctor put her hands on her hips in her trademarked pose of authority on whatever subject she needed to emphasise.
“Ok, ok.” Haana pouted. “We’re going. Jeez you need to lighten up Doctor. Get a Swedish sauna or get laid, maybe both.”
“Stop talking, stop talking now.” The Doctor growled.
Haana turned and left, picking up Claire casually and then both of them pried Geokai away from her sad & obsessive fangirl activities.
“I never knew what I saw in that girl.” The Doctor muttered. “It’s a good job that other me died or I would kick her ass about now for not warning me about her. It’s a good job she’s on our side, if she ever turned evil no woman would ever be safe again.”
“Talking to yourself is a sign of madness, Doctor.” Debbie wandered back over to where the Doctor was standing.
“Well today it seems like it’s the only way to get an intelligent conversation.” The Doctor looked at her companion who was still almost wearing clothes that were too tight and revealing. “Lets get Webbi and get out of here. I don’t fancy being around when they begin the final slaughter of the population.”
Webbi groaned a bit and managed to pull herself up to her knees, all eight of them. “Oh no, my host body’s dissolved.”
The Doctor and Debbie helped Webbi regain her composure and after only five bloodcurdling minutes the eight legs stopped screaming at the top of her voice.
“Come on!” The Doctor shouted. “This way!” She pointed to the nearest part of the laseron defence screen.
Webbi was feeling altogether herself again and she raced over to the edge of the shield. “How are we going to get through this?”
“Sonic screwdriver of course.” The Doctor pulled out the slender silver gadget from her inside jacket pocket. “No wait a minute, this is that neutraliser I had to confiscate from that charming but over-eager MIB agent a while back.” She fished inside her other inside jacket pocket and pulled out her faithful old sonic screwdriver. “Level eight should do it.”
“Are you sure?” Debbie asked. “We don’t have three and a half hours and even then you have that silly grin all over your face for a week.”
“Ok, ok.” The Doctor changed the settings. “Level twenty seven it is.” She aimed the sonic device at the defence screen and activated it. “Come on, last one back to the TARDIS buys the cream cakes!”
“Can I have mosquito’s in mine?” Webbi asked as she easily kept pace with the others.”
“Sure, if you get there first.” The Doctor replied.
“Great.” Webbi set off at a frantic pace, easily reaching the speed of sound and then surpassing it with a thunderous boom.


The controls responded automatically to the Doctor’s touch, she didn’t break a single nail in an effort to coax the thing into working properly. The ship dematerialised as a constant barrage of laser cannon fire erupted from both sides as the rebel tax evaders fought back against the tyrant of the taxmen.


Seven sets of eyes watched the planet explode, from a safe distance of course. The Doctor turned away from the fireball and dabbed at the tears rolling down her cheeks. “There should have been another way.”
Webbi turned all five sets of her eyes away too. “I know I can’t cry, not having tear ducts and also me being a more advanced species in general. However when I next posses a human body and get tear ducts then I will cry a river for the loss of life we have seen today. Who wants to play volley ball then?”
Debbie switched the scanner off. “Ok, I’ll go and change into something more revealing.”
“I don’t see how.” The Doctor whispered quietly. “Wait up, three can play right? I’ve got a black one-piece costume somewhere, I know it feels like we’ve drifted apart but that’s nothing a lot of healthy non-sexual female bonding can’t resolve right? We can put our hair up in bunches and watch chick flicks and talk about hair and lipstick and the mystery that is men.”
“I suppose.” Debbie had no idea what the Doctor was talking about but she seemed genuine about it, whatever it was.
“When do I get my cream cake?” Webbi asked hopefully as they walked through the twisty, turny corridors of the TARDIS.
The Doctor smiled. “Once we land at our next destination Webbi, it’s a whole planet dedicated to producing cakes and other sweet foods.”
“What’s wrong with it?” Webbi felt that something was up. Things seemed too good to be true. There must be something wrong, maybe they were running out of new confectionary ideas and they needed the creative input of the three of them to save the planet from economic chaos?
The Doctor’s smile faded a little. “It’ll be wiped out by an Ajax war fleet in less than five hours.”
“Only time for two cakes each then.” Webbi sighed. “So who’s on my team?”


Elsewhere – a blonde woman sat alone in a cottage and drank a cup of freshly brewed tea…