Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at
http://archiveofourown.org/works/139291.
Rating: General Audiences
Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Category: Gen
Fandom: Sarah Jane Adventures, Doctor Who, Sarah Jane Smith (Big
Finish Audio)
Character: Sarah Jane Smith, Jo Jones
Collections: Yuletide 2010
Stats: Published: 2010-12-14 Words: 2171
In Need
by paranoidangel
Summary
The Doctor changed Sarah's life. Twice.
Notes
Spoilers for Death of the Doctor.
The title is from the saying "A friend in need is a friend indeed".
Although it's technically a crossover with the Sarah Jane Smith
audios, I've just used their ideas for where Harry is. You can read
this without ever having listened to the audios.
Beta by hhertzof and lost_spook.
"Here we are again, Harry." Sarah raised her glass to the empty chair.
"Another year, another dinner alone." She finished her wine and refilled the
glass. "This place is under new management now. They didn't even
recognise me." They'd been coming to this Italian restaurant every year for
long enough that the staff remembered them and greeted them by name.
But not this year.
"I couldn't remember how long it had been since you left on your hush-hush
mission, I had to check my diary. And not a word from you since." She'd
found it had been longer than she cared to remember. "I should stop coming
here. It only reminds me how much I miss you when I have dinner alone." She
sighed. "But there's no one else I can talk to and it's not as if you have a
grave I can go to."
Her glass was already half-empty and she didn't remember drinking any of
it. Harry would tell her she shouldn't be drinking so much, but he wasn't
here. She put the glass back down on the table all the same. Out of the
corner of her eye she noticed a woman at a nearby table giving her a funny
look. Sarah turned away and caught sight of herself in the mirror that was
set along one wall. Then she saw herself as others must have seen her: a
sad, lonely, old woman having dinner on her own and talking to herself.
"They must all think I'm mad," she said to herself and smiled at the joke,
however terrible it was. "Maybe I am, but I don't care." She poured out some
of the water Harry always insisted they had and some of it sloshed onto the
table. "Maybe I just miss my friends and my old life." She had a sip of the
water. She would blame the wine for her melancholy, but the real cause was
the occasion and the Christmas not long past that she'd spent on her own,
watching the spaceship in the sky and wondering if the Doctor was alive.
"Now I'm just malingering." Since Harry wasn't there she had to imagine
what he'd say to her. "Now then, old girl," she said, in a terrible imitation of
Harry's voice, "things aren't all that bad. You still have your health." She
shook her head. "As if that ever got anyone anywhere."
At the table opposite there were enough strange looks that she could see
them without making an effort. She signalled the waiter to bring the bill. "I
should stop coming here." But she knew she wouldn't, not until Harry was
either found or dead.
***
Back home, she kicked off her shoes and lay back on the sofa. Despite the
warm weather, her flat felt cold and empty. She'd never felt the need to get
married and she didn't desperately want a husband, but it would be nice to
return home and have someone there who was pleased to see you. Someone
to talk to. But she'd either made enemies of all her friends or nearly got
them killed. She was much better on her own and they were much better off
without her.
Before she left for dinner she'd put her laptop on the floor, so she didn't
have to reach far to pick it up now. She'd been running late, as usual, so she
hadn't bothered shutting it down before she left. When she brought it back
to life it showed her the article she'd been writing. It was about the vaccine
Harry had created that had saved so many lives. Now he wasn't around she
wanted people to know what he'd done. He should get recognition for it. But
only a few people knew what the vaccine was really for and she couldn't
publish that. Without that knowledge, he hadn't done anything that special.
She sighed, closed the document and turned back to her news searches. It
was amazing how many UFO sightings there were, once you looked. Most of
them were hoaxes, of course, but Sarah had been doing this long enough to
spot the real ones. It helped that the Brigadier had sent her a few things
about the forty UFO sightings there had been in one borough of London. If
UNIT thought it worth keeping an eye on, it was definitely worth
investigating. She really ought to make more of an effort to see the
Brigadier, she thought. They communicated by email a few times a year, but
that was usually work-related. The last Christmas party she'd been to at his
house had been the year after Harry disappeared.
A few minutes cross-searching and she found that all those UFO sightings
were in the same borough as a school that had record results and they
began about the same time. There were no coincidences, and this certainly
wasn't one. As she read about the headmaster she knew what angle to take
to get access to information. A bit of flattery, the name of a good newspaper
and she would find out just what was going on at Deffrey Vale.
"Tomorrow, we're going back to school," she said to K9, who was silent. He
sat in a corner, dark and dead. And he'd likely stay that way until he was
invented in three thousand years time. But she stood up and patted him
anyway. She really ought to break this habit of talking to friends who
weren't there any more.
*****
After the TARDIS had taken the Doctor away from the attic, Rani and Clyde
were keen to show Santiago everything, so Sarah Jane brought Jo to the
kitchen for a cup of tea while they waited for the taxi to arrive.
"It makes you think, doesn't it?" Jo said as she sat at the kitchen table.
"Hearing that an old friend of yours is dead, even if he isn't really, makes you
glad that everyone else who is still alive is still alive."
"I never believed he was dead." Having poured the tea out, Sarah Jane sat
beside her and put a mug down in front of each of them. "But all the same, it
did make me wonder what would happen if the Doctor really died."
"I'm sure it's not going to happen for a long time." Jo raised her mug. "To the
Doctor."
Sarah Jane smiled and chinked her mug against Jo's. "To the Doctor."
After a sip, Jo smiled. "I'm so glad to see him again. I gave up ever thinking I
would."
"I did too. I thought he was dead." Now, though, she could laugh about it,
having met two regenerations of the Doctor since then. "But then I saw him
again and he changed my life again."
"Did it need changing the second time?"
Sarah Jane nodded. "I'd had so many friends die or disappear that I got used
to being alone. The Doctor gave me back two of them. Then I adopted Luke
and now I have to struggle to get enough peace and quiet to do any work."
Jo laughed. "Children are like that." Then she sobered. "I wish I saw mine
more often. It's good to have Santiago around but sometimes I wish that all
of us could stay together all the time."
"They grow up and leave home." Sarah Jane couldn't quite smile about that,
because she still missed Luke.
Jo nodded. "Oh, I wouldn't change their lives for anything. I only think that
when I haven't seen Cliff for a while. He reminds me about all the great
things they're doing in the world."
Sarah Jane thought about what Jo had said about where her husband was
and where she'd been and she wondered just how often Jo saw him. At least
Luke wasn't far away and she still had Rani and Clyde just round the corner.
She wondered if, despite all those children and adventures Jo had had, if she
was really better off. But then she realised she'd recognised a name. "Your
husband isn't Cliff Jones, is he?" she asked, putting her mug down.
"He is. You've heard of him?"
Of course she had. It was a subject she was interested in after all. But it
wasn't one she'd pursued for a long time. "There was a big piece in the
paper about him at the climate conference."
"Well, I'm glad someone saw it." Jo grinned widely. "We're trying to educate
more people about global warming."
"If it's articles you want, I'm still a journalist. Saving the world from aliens
doesn't pay the bills."
Jo put a hand on Sarah Jane's arm. "That would be marvellous, if you could."
"I'd love to help. Call me next time you're in London, and I'm sure we'll be
able to work something out."
Jo's smile broadened, if that was possible. She smiled so much it was
infectious. "I will. I'm so glad I met you, Sarah Jane. We must make sure to
keep in touch."
"We will." What with Harry being missing she welcomed an adult friend she
could talk to about the Doctor. "I'll give your love to the Doctor, next time I
see him."
"You see him that often?" There was a hint of jealousy in Jo's voice.
Sarah Jane shook her head. She hadn't meant to imply that and she could
understand just how Jo was feeling. "The first time I left I thought I'd see him
again soon. The second time I was sure it was the last. But now I think
maybe I will. But if I don't, that's fine. I've had more than my fair share."
"You know, I am jealous of that," Jo admitted. "But I wouldn't give my life up
for yours."
"I wouldn't change mine either."
They smiled at each other before they were interrupted by three teenagers.
"Gran, the taxi's here."
Jo finished her tea in one go. "I'm sorry. Here I am, nattering away and not
paying enough attention. This is why I don't go anywhere alone," she said to
Sarah Jane. "I'd never be where I was supposed to. I'd be forever missing
boats and trains and going the wrong way."
"That's Gran all right," Santiago muttered fondly just loud enough for Sarah
Jane to hear, as Clyde and Rani took him outside to see the street.
"It's been so good to meet someone else who knew the Doctor," Sarah Jane
said, as she finished her tea and she and Jo followed them out.
As Jo enthusiastically said goodbye to Clyde and Rani, Sarah Jane could see
what the Doctor saw in her because it was the same thing she saw in Clyde,
Rani, Luke and Maria. All you needed was enthusiasm and friendship and
you could do anything you put your mind to.
***
Sarah Jane smiled at the waiter who took her plate, and then pulled her wine
glass closer. "I keep thinking I should bring Luke to meet you, but you're
never here for him to meet. He's at Oxford University now. I don't know if it's
the same college as you went to. You never told me which one it was." Given
that Harry rarely spoke about anything personal, it was amazing that she
even knew which university he'd gone to. She swilled the wine around in the
glass. She was drinking it slowly, so she could justify not having bought a
whole bottle.
"I almost asked the Doctor about you. He took me to another planet, after all
this time." She smiled, remembering what it had been like to see a sky that
was another, alien colour. "He said that last time he regenerated, he looked
back on everyone. I wonder if he visited you, if he knows where you are." She
sighed and had a sip of wine. "But I didn't want him to tell me if it was bad
news. I think I'd rather live in hope that you're alive than believe you're
dead." It was probably crazy, but she mostly confined her hopes to their
annual dinner, these days. Before he disappeared she sometimes didn't see
Harry between dinners, so it wasn't much different now.
"But I did meet Jo Grant. She's Jo Jones, these days. Did you ever know her,
when you worked at UNIT?" She hadn't thought to ask Jo, given everything
else that had been going on. Their reminiscences had stuck to the places
the Doctor had taken them.
The waiter came round with the bill, keen for her to leave, she supposed,
given how busy the restaurant was this evening. Another change of
management, not to mention menu, had made the place more popular.
"Everything changes," she said, as she left enough money for the meal and a
tip before finishing the wine. "But if you ever come back, Harry, I'll be here,
still saving the world from aliens." She smiled, enjoying the memories of
Harry their annual dinners brought back to here. Even if he was dead, she
would never stop coming to them.
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