The Amazing Adventures of Spitfire and the Doctor

by Lucky Seven

A Grand Entrance

It was Saturday, and it seemed that all the citizens of Ponyville were out having a good time. Ponies were talking, playing sports, and a few were simply relaxing and catching some rays. The beautiful day had even attracted a few tourists. Among those tourists was Spitfire, captain of the Wonderbolts, and self proclaimed ‘best golden thing on the planet’. At the moment, she was heading down the dirt road leading to Fluttershy’s cottage, intent on getting herself a pet of some kind. It was as if almost everypony had one nowadays, and she wanted in on the trend.

Along the way though, Spitfire became aware of a noise in the distance, and she stopped in her tracks. A humming began to resonate, getting louder each time, and it was accompanied by a low whirring sound. She couldn’t help but wonder what the source of the noise was and began looking around, desperate for any clues. But all she could see were fields of grass and flowers. Finally, with no other options left, and the noise only increasing in decibels, she decided to call out to it.

“Hello? Is anypony there?”

As if answering her question, a flash of light appeared in the sky and she took notice of a blue object flying right at her, spinning around like a top the whole time. But there was no time to study it, as it was about to collide with the ground and, by extension, her. Extending her wings, Spitfire took to the air with the speed of a hawk and narrowly avoided being splattered by the mysterious flying object, which slid for a few meters before coming to a rest.

Turning back around mid flight, Spitfire slowed to a mere hover and took the time to examine the blue box. Without having to fly for her life, she could tell that it was some sort of phone booth. But what kind of phone booth could appear out of thin air and fly? Her question was left unanswered as the doors on the front of it suddenly opened.

After a few moments, a... something, walked out of the box. It was unlike anything she had ever seen, and she planted her hind hooves into the ground, ready to take off at a moment’s notice. After all, it could be a threat to her, and she wasn’t going to take any chances.

Examining it more closely, she saw that it had a brown mane, but no tail. It was dressed in a blue suit, and it appeared to be smiling. Odd, considering it had just crash landed, and almost crushed her in the process. Then again, there didn’t seem to be any windows on that thing except on the very top of each side, so seeing her would have been out of the question. Though, considering that it was piloting a phone booth of all things, it was most likely capable of anything.

Spitfire was broken out of her thoughts, however, when the odd looking thing spoke. Not having heard what it said, but only assuming it had been directed towards her, she pointed at herself with a hoof, earning a nod from the creature.

“Yes, you! Can you come down here?”

From the voice, Spitfire could easily infer that the creature calling to her was a male, and intelligent at that, since it was capable of speaking Equestrian. But should she listen to him and go down to where he was currently standing?

Deciding she had nothing to lose, Spitfire did just that, flying down to the... thing, and his blue phone booth. She came to a stop just a few feet away from him and gently touched down on the ground. For a few seconds, the two simply stared at each other in silence, as if judging if the other could pose a threat.

Suddenly, the creature threw his arms outwards, as if having finally realized something. “Of course! You’re an equine! Pegasus to be exact! I’ve never seen one of you before, oh this is just fantastic!”

“...”

“So have you got a name?”

“... Spitfire.”

“Like the plane?” His questioned garnered an odd look from her, and he chuckled to himself. “Of course you don’t know about planes, you’re a pegasus for crying out loud!” As soon as he finished talking, the new thing was upon her, looking her over, as if trying to find out everything he could about her. “That’s interesting. Your wings don’t seem like they’d be big enough to keep you in the air,” he observed, a baffled expression on his face.

Spitfire gave a chuckle at his confusion, and quickly explained, “That’s our innate magic. It makes our wings stronger than they should be.”

“Magic, eh? Well, I suppose there’s a first time for everything,” he said with a shrug. Spitfire simply giggled as he went further back and began staring at her flank. “And what about this mark on your flank?” he asked, examining the flaming wings closely.

“That’s called a cutie mark. It shows our special talent. Mine is stunt flying. Now just who are you?”

Smiling, the creature stood back up. “I’m the Doctor.”

“The Doctor? That’s your name? Like, your whole name?”

“Yep! Now, if you don’t mind, I need to go see the rest of this planet,” the Doctor said, wheeling around and walking back towards his blue box, hands in his pockets the whole time.

Spitfire had no idea why she said what she did next, but it just seemed to blurt itself out. “Wait!”

In an instant, this ‘Doctor’ turned back around and leaned his head forwards, as if trying to hear her better. “Hm?”

“What’s that blue box?” she asked, pointing a hoof at the object for emphasis.

“Oh, that? That’s the TARDIS.”

“What’s it do?” she questioned, making the Doctor smile.

“My, you’re quite the inquisitive one, aren’t you?” the Doctor asked, earning a chuckle from Spitfire.

“I wouldn’t say that, but I’ve never seen something like that, not to mention something like you,” she replied, pointing a hoof right at his chest. “What are you anyways?”

“A Time Lord,” he swiftly replied.

“Time Lord?”

“That is what I said, isn’t it?”

Spitfire shook her head to rid herself of her confusion before replying. “Whatever. So what can your thing do?”

“This machine can do a lot of things. She’s capable of flying, for one. But you already knew that, didn’t you?” he laughed.

“Duh! It almost slammed right into me!”

“Oh, it did? Sorry about that,” he apologized, sorrow evident on his face.

“Well, I’m fine, and that’s all that matters,” she said, earning a nod from the Doctor. “So what else does the… what did you call it?” she asked, already having forgotten the name of his box.

“TARDIS,” he repeated.

“Right, so what else can your ‘TARDIS’ do?”

“Well,” he began as he walked back to the TARDIS, Spitfire following close behind, “it can teleport to anywhere I want it to.”

“That sounds awesome!” Spitfire yelled enthusiastically, making him smile again.

“It is ‘awesome’, isn’t it? Would you like to see it from the inside?”

Spitfire stopped in her tracks. “No. Way. I can really go inside?”

“If you want to, yeah. Besides, I’ve never had a pegasus on board. Though I have ridden a horse once.”

Spitfire found that last part odd, but decided not to say anything about it.

After a few seconds, the two arrived at the TARDIS, and the Doctor was about to open the doors when a concern crosses Spitfire’s mind. “Hey, won’t it be cramped in that little thing?”

Smirking at her, he replied, “I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.”

With that, he opened the doors to the TARDIS and Spitfire peered inside. What she saw seemed impossible. “It’s…”

“Bigger on the inside,” the two said at the same time, making Spitfire laugh. It was like the Doctor had been reading her mind.

“Why is it so golden?”

“Huh,” the Doctor looked around a bit, then back to Spitfire. “You know, I’m not sure.”

“You’re a strange one, Doctor,” Spitfire giggled.

“Stranger than a pegasus that uses magic to fly?” That got another laugh out of her. She still had more questions, though.

“So what’s this big thing in the middle?”

“Oh, that?” The Doctor went up to the column and rested a hand on it. “That’s the ‘engine’, if you will.”

“And the stuff below it?”

“The control panel.” Spitfire reached a hoof towards it, but found it smacked away by his hand. “Eh, don’t, uh, don’t touch it. Not yet, at least.”

“Fair enough,” she shrugged. After all, she was in his ‘TARDIS’.

“So, where do you want to go, Miss Spitfire?”

“So I can go anywhere?” she inquired.

The Doctor nodded. “Theoretically, yes. Buuuut we don’t want to go to certain places,” he explained.

“Like where?”

“Well, we could teleport into the sun, but that would be a very stupid idea.”

Putting a hoof to her chin in thought, Spitfire began to think of places she wanted to see. The possibilities were literally endless, something that excited her greatly. For some reason, though, her mind kept going back to one area in particular. “Can we just go a bit into space?”

“What, you mean above the planet?” he asked, waiting for confirmation.

"Well, I more meant outside of this galaxy. That's a 'bit' as far as space goes, right?"

“Now why would you want to go into outer space?” he questioned, seemingly intrigued with the golden mare’s decision.

“I just feel like this planet is holding me back sometimes. The skies are sweet, but I’ve always wanted to see more, I guess.”

“What if I told you I could take you anywhere you wanted to go, whenever you wanted?”

Spitfire reeled back. That question certainly caught her off guard. “W-what do you mean?” she replied, not quite sure of the implications of his question.

“I mean you could come with me, and then you could go anywhere you wanted to. See anything you wanted to see. Do anything you wanted to do!”

“Wouldn't it be a bit weird, though? I mean, we just met, Doctor.”

“Yeah, we did,” he smirked, “but I’m not one for taking things slow.”

“Why’s that? Why rush through life?”

“I’m a time traveler, it sort of comes with the title.”

“Y-you can travel through time, too?”

“Yep.”

“Well… it does sound like it could be fun. I don’t really have anything I’m committed to here other than the Wonderbolts, either. But being captain of them can get so stressful. I was actually thinking of resigning after my vacation anyways.”

“Tell you what. Why don’t we go somewhere together first, and you can decide there? After we go to space, of course. It's been a while since I've had somebody with me, and it can get pretty lonely traveling for eons by yourself.”

“But why me?” she questioned, clearly confused as to why he would pick a mare like her. “I’m not super smart or anything, so why me?”

“Because,” he began replying, “it’s not always experience that makes one best for a job. It’s how willing, or eager, they are to do it.”

Spitfire thought on what the Doctor had just said, but as soon as she saw the inside of the TARDIS, her mind was made up. She wouldn’t tell him yet, though; better to make it suspenseful. After all, that was her style. Taking notice of the Doctor messing with his machinery, she abandoned her thoughts. Unable to tear her eyes away from the spectacle before her, she didn’t hear his warning. She tumbled to the floor, and the entire TARDIS began shaking wildly.

But as quickly as it had started it stopped, and Spitfire stood back up, dusting herself off.

“A warning would’ve been nice, you know.”

“I did warn you! No, you know what, let’s just go look at space,” he said, realizing arguing would get them nowhere at the moment.

Walking over to the doors of the TARDIS, he motioned for Spitfire to come with him. As soon as they reached the doors, he nudged them open and Spitfire’s jaw dropped. She was looking at space. She was actually looking at space, from space. Nopony had ever even been to the highest point on the planet, and she had already trumped that one thousand fold.

“Marvelous, isn’t it?” the Doctor’s voice broke her free of her stupor, but she could still only manage a nod, her jaw still wide open at what was happening. “It really makes you realize just how small we actually are. Your planet is just one of billions.”

“What, uh, what are we looking at right now?”

“Oh, this? This is the Eagle Nebula,” he informed her, much to her confusion.

“But it doesn’t look anything like an eagle!”

“Sometimes, it takes a bit of creativity to see things the way you’re supposed to. To some, a book might just be words on paper. But for others, it’s an adventure that you could only wish to live out in real life.”

“I don’t get it. I mean, I do, but this is just a blob. It’s nothing like an eagle!”

“Had you looked at the finer details, you’d see that it’s not just an ordinary blob. It’s blue, it’s green, it’s a wild mishmash of colors! And the shape is clearly the head of an eagle, too.”

Taking a closer look, Spitfire could see that he was right. But that wasn’t what was on her mind right now.

“I’ll go with you,” she stated. "I guess it wouldn't hurt to see if we like traveling with each other. But remember, just one trip for now!"

The Doctor, who looked pleasantly surprised, smiled. “Well, that’s brilliant!” he exclaimed, closing the doors to the TARDIS, and walking back over to the controls. “Now, how would you fancy a trip to the lovely planet Koorharn for some ice skating?”

“Let’s do it!” Spitfire grinned.

At her exclamation, the Doctor smirked and smacked a button, sending them on their trip.

“ALLONS-Y!”