Doctor, Doctor!

 

“Doctor? What does this button do?” The ditzy, mini-skirt clad girl asked with a silly giggle, pointing to a button marked ‘left.’

 

“Why, my dear, that will make the Tardis swing to the left.” The tall, long-coated, faintly bemused man replied, smiling at her benignly, and pressing it to illustrate the point.

 

“And this one?” She curled some hair around her finger, and pointed to a button marked ‘Right.’

 

“Will swing us to the right!” The doctor announced, with a beaming smile at her charming, gender-related lack of intelligence.

 

“What about this?” she asked, pressing a button marked ‘Create Rift In Space-Time Continuum.’ A blue, swirly phenomenon appeared on their viewscreen. The Doctor smiled at her tolerantly.

 

“Oops.” He said.

 

*****

 

The slender, impossibly large-breasted woman, with her hair styled into an immaculately sleek bob, pushed her way into the hospital.

 

“Are you one of the doctors here?” She asked the young man, in a pushy, bossy, no-nonsense, ‘I’m a woman of the nineties’ tone of voice.

 

“Uh, yeah.” He glanced down at his white coat, and carried on running down the corridor, alongside a stretcher bearing a groaning occupant, with a mass of dark curls, who was moaning: “Bodie, Bodie…Christ, where are you, Bodie…?”

 

“Good.” The woman ignored the patient’s pathetic cries. “My name’s Lois Lane, I’m with the Daily Planet. We’ve heard reports of a strange, blue, swirly thing opening up in the sky, and all these weird people falling through. Can you confirm this for us, Doctor…?”

 

“Carter – and I don’t know anything about that. All I know is we’ve got patients being brought in by the dozen, some of them dressed in very strange outfits, and we’re rushed off our feet, so if you could excuse us…”

 

“Hmm.” Lois gazed after him, with a faintly put-out frown creasing her lovely forehead. “This sounds like a job for Superman to me,” she remarked to her bespectacled, but stunningly handsome, broad-shouldered companion.

 

“Superman?” A small redhead, with her hair styled into an immaculately sleek bob, strode into the corridor. “Excuse me, but are you suggesting that humankind should look to mythical comic book inventions to resolve our crises?” She asked, in a tone of disbelief.

 

“Oh shit. She’s off again.” Her lanky, dark-haired, pouty-lipped partner remarked to his bespectacled, but stunningly handsome, broad-shouldered boss, who was striding along next to him. “Scully, after all you’ve seen, why can’t you believe?”

 

“Mulder, this longing for a ‘superman’ is clearly an expression of an underlying desire for an omnipotent figure to save us from the excesses of our increasingly secular age.” Scully told him tersely.

 

“Um, excuse me, miss, who are you?” Lois Lane’s companion asked.

 

“Dana Scully…FBI…” She replied, showing him her badge, and suddenly going weak in her usually rational knees as the stunning man shook her hand. she berated herself.

 

“I’m telling you, B.J., this is not Korea.” A tall, lanky, cute guy remarked, wandering down the corridor deep in conversation with his hunky blond companion.

 

“It’s a hospital though, Hawkeye – and there are injured people here. I say we just do what we do best, then get back to the swamp,” his companion replied. “Where’s ‘Hotlips’?”

 

“I’m here.” A busty blonde said, pushing her way through the ever-increasing throng.

 

“Hotlips? You let them call you that?” Lois asked, fascinated.

 

“Yes, lady. I may be cast in a time before women were allowed to be doctors and FBI agents, or both at the same time,” the blonde woman glared meaningfully at Scully, “but hell, I’m still feisty,” she snarled. “Nobody messes with Margaret Houlihan – and when I say ‘jump’, these guys jump.”

 

“Yo. We’re jumping.” Hawkeye winked at her, holding up his arms in surrender and sauntering off down the corridor.

 

“Now – where are all the casualties? Any incoming wounded?” Hotlips asked, glancing around.

 

“Well…that woman over there looks pretty ill.” Lois pointed towards a tall, slender woman with impossibly large breasts.

 

“My god, yes!” Hotlips exclaimed rushing over. “She’s covered in spots.”

 

“No…you don’t understand,” the spotty lady tried to explain. “My name’s Jadzia. I’m a Trill. I’m supposed to have these spots…”

 

“Get away from her, you bitch!”

 

Everyone backed away, as a tall, emaciated woman with a shaved scalp strode down the corridor, wielding a massive gun, which she was pointing at Jadzia. “This woman is an alien and must be destroyed. Stand back, Margaret.”

 

“I’m not that kind of alien, Ripley.” Jadzia said frantically.

 

“Aliens? Did anyone mention aliens?” A slender man, with a blond wig woven from the finest nylon walked into their midst, accompanied by a stunningly handsome, but ever so slightly clueless, companion in a skimpy string vest. “My name is Ed Straker, and this is my right hand man,” Ed flushed slightly, “Paul Foster. Miss Ripley is quite right. The alien woman must be destroyed.”

 

“I disagree.” Mulder stepped forward, waving his badge around. “You’re stuck in a seventies time warp, Straker. Things have moved on. Nowadays we want to make contact with aliens. We want to be their friends. We don’t want to kill then. Not until we’ve learned how their technology works anyway.”

 

“That’s right,” Scully said. “We no longer externalise our xenophobic fear of other cultures by creating a quasi-mythological ‘monster’ figure, against whom mankind will unite and fight.”

 

“Quite.” Mulder nodded. “And anyway – I need some proof or they’ll shut down the X Files again.”

 

“Fox! Look out!” Skinner warned, just in time, as a stunningly handsome, dark-haired man materialised right in front of the FBI agent. The newcomer was clad from head to toe in tight black leather, covered in shiny silver studs. Mulder looked him up and down, and then turned an interesting shade of red, grasping onto Skinner’s arm for support.

 

“Walter – you weren’t thinking of selling me to another top were you?” he whimpered pathetically.

 

“Well now…” The latest arrival murmured, negligently waving his gun around. “This is an interesting gathering. My name is Avon – and these…” he gestured to a stunningly beautiful black woman, and a pretty, slender blonde, “are my fellow rebels, Dayna and Soolin.”

 

“I’m Dayna.” The black woman said. “Actually I’m a weapons expert but you wouldn’t know it. Mostly I just make the tea onboard our ship, Scorpio. I’m afraid we’re from the seventies too,” she murmured with a regretful sigh. “I wish I got to do real stuff, like you nineties women.”

 

“Oh it’s not all that great,” Scully sighed. “I mean I’m never allowed to have sex, and the price I pay for the high-powered career is never being able to have children. Actually, my ovaries were stolen by evil government conspirators who used them to…it’s a long story,” she trailed off, noticing that people were giving her some very strange looks.

 

“It sounds better than being the nurse and receptionist onboard the Enterprise,” a graceful black woman in a ludicrous red miniskirt informed her.

 

“Uhura’s right,” a blonde woman in an equally ludicrous blue miniskirt said, nodding sadly. “We never have sex either,” she confided. “Only Jim is ever allowed to have sex, but then he is the Alpha Male.”

 

“Where is this Jim? He sounds interesting…” Mulder murmured.

 

“Don’t even think about it,” Walter growled, taking him possessively by the arm.

 

“Oh honestly!” Scully snapped. “You’re not even the real Mulder and Skinner. You’re slash fanfic Fox ‘n Walter. You were created by women in the late 20th century, who so lacked strong female role models to identify with in television programmes, that they were forced to envisage themselves as men, writing scenarios in which they made love to their favorite fantasy figures within a male body.”

 

“Or maybe they just liked the idea of two great looking guys in the sack together,” Soolin commented, casting a lustful glance at Ed and Paul, who were surreptitiously holding hands in the background.

 

“Whatever.” Scully sniffed. “I’m not real Scully either. I’m slash fan-fiction Scully, reduced to spouting long amounts of exceedingly boring dialogue which nobody ever listens to.”

 

“No, you are the real Scully.” Mulder told her with an infuriating grin.

 

“I do not understand who the hell any of you are,” a voice behind them said. They all stopped talking and glanced around as a tall, broad shouldered, impossibly handsome man strode into their midst, waving an enormous sword. Scully was aware of her knees doing that irrational weak thing again. “But my name is Duncan McCleod of the Clan McCleod, and I am an immortal.”

 

“I don’t care what you are, buddy, but, charming company not withstanding,” a smooth featured man took hold of Scully’s hand and bestowed a kiss upon it, “Illya and I are late for an appointment and must leave.”

 

“Nobody leaves!” A deep rasping voice boomed. “Not until I have captured Princess Leia and the other rebels.”

 

“Rebels?” Avon aimed his gun at the black-masked, and severely asthmatic newcomer. “Has somebody betrayed us?” He spread his hands, looking utterly distraught. “Is it true? Have you betrayed us? Have you betrayed me?” He cried to the room in general.

 

“He’s horribly melodramatic. I much prefer your style, Walter,” Mulder whispered.

 

“Computer. End programme.”

 

Tom Paris whirled around.

 

“Aw, Tuvok! I was enjoying that! It was my favorite “Cult TV and Film of the 20th Century” holodeck programme. I was trying to fit in as many characters as I could manage. I designed it myself,” the blond haired pilot said proudly.

 

“Then you will be aware of the fact that you cannot possibly exist,” Tuvok told him. “As you too, are clearly an artificial creation from that same time period.”

 

“How do you know that?” Paris asked, looking confused.

 

“Because I read it in this book.” Tuvok held up the tome, and Paris frowned.

 

“You mean I’m not real either?” he asked.

 

“Regretfully, not.” Tuvok shook his head, and they both disappeared in a puff of logic.

 

*****

 

“Doctor, what is it? Have you fixed it?” The girl clapped her hands together, and gazed admiringly at her clever male companion, wondering briefly why he had grown another head, and resisting an urge to address the new head as ‘Zaphod’.

 

“Yes, my dear. There – see. I’ve used the Tardis’s Ultimate Improbability Drive to turn the entire rift into a book, thereby saving the universe yet again.”

 

The Doctor smiled at her indulgently. Then, ignoring all the known laws of physics, he opened the door of the Tardis, reached into the darkness, and plucked the book out of space where previously there had been a blue, swirly thing.

 

“There, there, no harm done,” he said, admiring the book with a satisfied air. “Be a good girl and put this in the library with all the others.”

 

“Yes, doctor.” The girl took the book and glanced at the front cover. There were two words emblazoned on the front: DON’T PANIC.

 

 THE END

 

Get them all? They were, in order of appearance: Doctor Who, The New Adventures of Superman, ER, The Professionals, X Files, MASH, Deep Space 9, Alien(s), UFO, Blake’s 7, Star Trek, Highlander, Man From Uncle, Star Wars, Voyager, The HitchHikers Guide to the Galaxy.

 

 

Index