“So THIS is Ancient Greece?”  One of the two women standing on a low hill asked as she thought of the idealised Hollywood image of a land of myths, legends and dodgy American accents, a country filled with beautiful buildings, sumptuous panoramic landscapes and then she saw the truth “It’s a bit dusty isn’t it?”  Penny Bayley, a shop assistant turned time traveller, complained to her semi sort of casual friend Haana, who was more of a casual acquaintance than a best friend.

Hannah Sinclair, or Haana as she liked to be called now, was once a nice normal human girl - from Miami.  Then her DNA had been altered in an overly complex scheme by a villainous aspect of the mysterious, enigmatic and probably kooky blonde Time Lady known only as The Doctor.  As a result of this meddling Haana found that she had two hearts and an infinitely extended sell by date.  She inspected the ground with a critical eye to confirm or denounce her very best friend’s findings.  “Yep, that’s dirt all right, well done Penny.”

Penny looked around for a while.  The view was quite nice, a group of naked muscular blokes wrestling.  The mood was ruined however when Haana kept waving her hand in front of her face.  “I was enjoying myself.”  Penny complained.  “They’re naked men, I like them a lot.  They make great birthday presents and there’s never a bad time to have them around.  Can’t we stay here for a few more hours?”

“I think we’ll go this way.”  Haana flipped a quarter and pointed to the nearby city gates.  “We can see if Alexander’s at home, then we can shop.”  Haana adjusted the weight of her small handbag on her shoulder.  The Doctor kept a whole toolkit in her bag but Haana kept coins of every denomination in case she needed to buy an emergency pair of shoes or ten.  There were also enough credit cards to reasonably play a game of snap.  Most of it had come about through her natural ability to play poker, which wasn’t so much a game of chance as maths.  To be blunt she cheated, to her counting cards was as easy as remembering to breathe in and out.  Combined with swimming they were her only hobbies, if you didn’t count the massive collection of Playboy magazines she used to possess.

Penny liked the market place; there were lots of wonderful things she could buy.  However their first mission was to meet Alexander, after all he was such a famous historical figure and he was supposed to be sexy too.  The palace was well guarded but they breezed into the kitchens no problem and after half an hour stumbling around they finally found the throne room.

“Then we will invade.”  Alexander knocked the heavy wooden doors open and strode through followed by his generals.  “Tell the Ambassador that if India does not wish to be our ally then she will become our enemy.”

Penny felt her heart lift, the guy was totally sexy and she just had to make him notice her.  She sighed as he vanished from view into the next room.  His buns had been gorgeous; she wanted to hold them for hours and hours and maybe have a little nibble now and again.

Haana looked at her doe eyed companion and shook her head.  “Know I know how the Doctor felt when my libido kicked in.  Come on Penny, there’s plenty of time to see the nice man later on.  They’re going to invade India, there’s plenty of jobs going for two enterprising women in the know.”

“Oh yuck.”  Penny gasped.  “I’m saving myself for him.  I want to give him my flower.”

“Oh great.”  Haana groaned to herself.  “She’s even worse that me.  I wonder if he has a sister though?  We might both get a little action, although the best we can probably hope for are a few servants.”

“So was Hercules real?”  Penny asked Haana after they had trudged around the city a few times.

“Ask him yourself.”  Haana pointed across the market place to him.

Penny looked at the tall muscular man.  “He doesn’t look the same as he does on TV.  I suppose Xena’s a plain woman with an A cup leather bodice?”

Haana pointed to a six-foot leather clad babe.  “She’s Xena.”  Haana waved to the buxom warrior who waved back unsure who the strange thin girl undressing her with her eyes was.  “I’m in there.”  She joked and winked at Penny.

“Where are we going anyway?”  Penny wondered as the headed towards yet another marketplace.  “There are a lot of people here.”

“We need to sign on as kitchen staff, the other options are less ideal as you’re saving yourself for King Wetdream and I don’t do that half of the species.  Even Greece isn’t that emancipated to us yet unless we become Amazons and between you and me I handle a sword rather less well than someone with no arms.”  Haana dragged Penny towards the hiring on tables.  “Just sign your name with a big shaky X unless you want them to think you’re from Britannia.”

The official looked at the two girls.  “Names.”  He wrote them down on the Egyptian parchment.  “Previous experience.”  Neither had done much but they seemed eager.  “Last employer.”  He’d never heard of Marks or Spencer but wrote them down.  “Put your marks here.”  He was surprised when they both signed their names, but intelligent staff members were better than the idiot girls he normally had to put up with when his nibs went off to invade somewhere.  He handed them a key.  “You’re in room 23, be ready to leave at a moment’s notice.”

The room was a simple affair of mud brick walls and straw on the floor.  The windows were near roof level but let some sunlight in.  There were two simple palette beds and they chose one each at random.

“Perhaps we should choose different beds?”  Penny asked Haana.  “Oh and please take your hand off my thigh.”

“That’s not my hand, that’s a rat.”  Haana applauded as Penny jumped off her bed and onto the other one before she gently persuaded the rodent to vacate their bedroom.  “I think we should practice our cooking skills.”  Haana took out a camping stove, a tin of baked beans and pulled on the ring pull to open the beans.  “Ah the old classic, lovely beans you are my secret mistress.”

“You can’t eat those!”  Penny complained.

“Too anachronistic?”  Haana asked.

Penny shook her head and tried not to laugh.  “No, the fumes will kill me.”

“I see.  Well we can always give them to the hookers next door in number 22.  They won’t be getting much sleep tonight anyway.”

Penny took her turn to stir the small pot of orange beans.  I could really do with a bacon butty right now, she thought to herself, some fried onions too and a large dollop of brown sauce.  Fishing into her own bag she took out a box of frozen bacon strips, a frying pan and some vegetable oil.  Then she took out four slices of bread, margarine and the brown sauce.  She started to fry the bacon while Haana took the bowls of beans around to the prostitutes and let her finish the rashers off when she returned.

“Fionus and Vickius are both very nice girls and they’re very grateful for the food.  I hope they appreciate the little drops of Penicillin I added.  They’re in a dangerous profession after all.” Haana got most of the hot oil off the crisp bacon with some kitchen roll and placed them on the buttered bread before putting the sauce covered lids on them and passing one to Penny.

Penny took a hungry bite out of the butty and sighed with simple pleasure.  “This is so good” she said with her mouth full.

In the end they did have to spend the night in the room although they didn’t get much sleep and decided to count the number of visitors to next door instead.  Penny finally woke up when Haana waved a cup of milky tea under her nose.  “What time is it?”  She groaned, as she got out of her sleeping bag.  “I’m glad we’re not doing THAT for a living they must be really fit to keep going that long.”

“Very fit and very broad minded.”  Haana mused, putting her receipt back into her bad then she handed Penny her cuppa.  “We’d better get this lot packed up before that bloke turns up.  She gestured to the small trolley of cream cakes and selected a vanilla slice.

“Cakes for breakfast?”  Penny was astonished.  “That apple turnover has my name on it when I get back from the loo.”

Haana stood up.  “We should go together.  I think some of their male visitors are still lurking about.”

“Ok.”  Penny nodded.  “I guess it’s better to be safe with a drooping pervert like you than risk getting raped.  Have you got the three-ply loo roll?”

In the end they had just gotten all their stuff packed up when Marcus, their boss, knocked at the door and he led them to the cart that would be their home and workplace for the next six to eight months.  They shared the cart with one other girl who was barely fifteen and painfully thin.  Her name was Annastotle and Haana quickly befriended her, feeding her up with cakes and pasta.

Penny got on well with the girl and they could talk for hours about how great boys were.  She even gave Anna, as they both called her, the talk about the birds and the bees, as she had no clue at all about it.

Haana would use every ingredient in her bag to prepare the most sumptuous meals for the soldiers and other hangers on.  Soon they were promoted to the officer’s tent where Penny would hope for a brief glimpse of Alexander himself.  She would fantasise for hours about their accidental meeting and he would sweep her off her feet and make her his concubine.

The officer’s meal tent was a lavish structure, which took thirty men to put up and take down.  It was decorated with banners, portraits and other treasures from the many successful campaigns they had fought in.  The floors were covered in fur and they had to leave their shoes at the doorway and walk barefoot on the fur, which felt great between their toes.

During the rest of the day they had to cook on the move, which wasn’t so bad.  They had a different driver each day to steer the horse to the various officers to take their orders.  However soon their expertise reached the ears of the one person Penny most wanted to meet.

“ALEXANDER WANTS TO SEE ME!!!!”  Penny screamed out loud as she hugged Haana and Anna before jumping up and down with joy.

“I believe it was all three of us as a matter of fact.”  Haana pointed out to her giddy friend.  “We’re both happy for you though aren’t we Anna?”

“Are you going to sleep with him?”  Anna asked, taking the development of tact back several hundred years.

Penny went weak at the knees as she curtseyed to Alexander.  He was even better looking now that she was this close.  His voice was rich and golden, every word a drop of honey to her ears.

“So you are the three cooks my generals are talking about?  I must admit you three are a strange group.  I was expecting three old crones but I am pleasantly surprised to see three beautiful women.  I wish to sample your cuisine, after all even a king must eat.”

“It would be the biggest honour of our lives.”  Penny agreed quickly.  “When shall we begin your majesty?”

“Come to us after the others have had their fill and I will see if you live up to your reputation.”  With a wave of his hand Alexander dismissed the three females.

Back in their cart Haana spoke of her worries to Penny.  “This isn’t right.  Alexander’s men desert him before they reach India because they were fed up of the poor conditions and the long march.  He dies a few months later when they get to his place in Babylon.  Our cooking has seriously increased the morale of the troops.”

“You think we should leave?”  Penny wondered.  “Before I get to have him?”

“Quite the opposite.”  Haana’s eyebrows lowered as she outlined her cunning plan.

Alexander finished off licking his fingers.  “That was the best banquet I’ve ever tasted.  The flavours, the textures.  Truly you three were sent here by the gods to bring us victory in India.  I am speechless with gratitude.”

“It was a simple meal Majesty.”  Haana explained.  “We had but moments to prepare it.  We are sorry it was not up to our usual standard.  If only we had more time to prepare it so that the meal was worthy of your position.”

“We would like more time to prepare a feast you would really enjoy tomorrow night.”  Penny added to Haana’s statement.

Alexander nodded.  “Of course, of course.  You three will be my personal cooks.  The others can see to the rest of the men.  Now I’m sure you have lots of pots to clean so I will give you permission to leave.”

Once Haana and Anna had left, as she had insisted they do, Penny set about clearing away the plates on the dining table.  “Majesty.”  She called out.  “I know it’s not my place to ask but is there anything else you need?  Anything at all you want or desire?  What ever it is I will see to it.”

Alexander laughed to himself at the girl’s obvious attempts to get into his bed.  She was beautiful enough but he thought to play with her a little longer.  “I would like a bowl of cherries, the red ones not the black.”  He waited for her to leave before sending his concubines away.

“He wants a bowl of cherries.”  Penny exclaimed as she searched through her bag.  “I don’t seem to have any.

“I’ve got some.”  Haana took a medium sized silver bowl of them out of her handbag.  “Good luck” she called after her rapidly disappearing friend.  “I think she’s pulled there don’t you Anna?”

Anna nodded and returned to drying the pots and pans with a Jessica Rabbit tea towel.

Haana heard Penny trying to creep back into the cart the next morning, she had a big grin on her face and her hair was a sight.  She pretended to wake up and catch Penny out.  “Nice time last night?”

Penny looked at Haana and her grin got wider.  “It was terrific, he was so gentle with me.”

“You did take proper precautions didn’t you?  We don’t want his love child turning up in modern day Earth.  They don’t like that at all you know; I think there’s a law against it.  Plus you’d loose your gorgeous eye candy figure.”

“I thought you knew all about time travel?”  Penny queried her queer friend.

“I’m still an undergraduate.”  Haana explained.  “I don’t graduate for another thirty or so years yet.  So did you use a condom?  Did you tie him up with those handcuffs I bought you for Christmas?”

“I’ve been on the pill ever since we got here.  I never knew when I’d get to have him under me.  I didn’t think I could wait much longer for him to put out, I think I’m getting a bit obsessed.  I think I do want to have six or seven of his babies”

“You were on top?”  Haana giggled like she was Anna’s age again.

“Only for the last time.  Now can I get some sleep please?”  Penny decided against getting undressed and she climbed straight into her sleeping bag.

When she finally woke up it was mid day and the mood of the army was decidedly ugly when the word spread that Haana, Penny and Anna would only be cooking for Alexander from now on.  Penny waited until the coast was clear before pulling on some clean underwear and a cute pink dress with a high hemline and a deep neckline.  Seeing Haana in the next tent practicing some moves with a belly dancer she left them alone and Anna was playing with some kids her own age.  Quickly she got out a big bar of galaxy and munched away happily to herself before she remembered to start cooking the special meal for Alexander.  The very thought of his name gave her goose bumps and that all over tingling feeling.

She pulled out a microwavable pudding and popped it in the microwave before plugging it into the extension cable that came out of her bag. When it pinged she turned it out and put some custard in to warm through.  Finally it was ready and she got the cart driver to hurry up to where Alexander was riding his horse along with his generals.

Haana waited for the cart to return and Penny was inside it grinning.  “What have you done?”  She asked her friend.

“I gave him a whole bowlful of sticky toffee pudding and custard right in front of his own generals.  The looks on their faces, this plan might just work you know.”

“We should leave soon.”  Haana said.  “Once tonight’s meal is done with of course.  We’ll let the others think that he’s imprisoned us to make sure no one else tastes the meals we make.  These last four months or so have really been a valuable history lesson to us both.”

The plan had been successful.  Alexander’s army had turned around and now Alexander lay inside of his bedroom desperately ill and a shadow of the powerful leader of men he had once been.

Penny hurt inside to see him like this and gently Haana led her away before one of the greatest chapters in Earths history was closed forever.

Their return to Gallifrey was interrupted somehow and they found themselves standing on a wooden raft in the middle of a large flat blue ocean…