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Sarah was supposed to be looking up the history of the Ealing Library. This was, after all, why she had come to the Ealing Library, rather than going to the supermarket or Mars. Luke had tagged along, claiming he had homework, but Sarah suspected that he really just wanted to hole up in the science section and read whatever he could get his hands on. She made a mental note to stop in the children's section and pick up a few books. If they were lying around the house, he'd read them and he needed the cultural context, even if he was simultaneously too young and too old for them.
With a sigh she went back to her work, carefully turning the aged crumbling page of the newspaper she was skimming. She'd inquired about microfilm or an online database the first time she'd needed to look something up in the local paper, only to have the librarian explain that they hadn't the funds to get the papers scanned. Sarah figured that this was an appropriate use of the money she had inherited from Aunt Lavinia, so she had made a donation. The work was progressing now, at a slow but steady pace, but they hadn't reached the volume she needed today, so she had found herself once again consulting the old bound volumes.
Normally this didn't bother her. She loved the smell of old newspaper, though it made her long for her early days as a reporter. But there was something odd about this volume. Her fingers once again traced the crack on the front cover. The crack that seemed to go straight through the entire volume, and yet- the crumbling leaves didn't split along that crack, as if it were just a line on the page, though she could feel the edges if she ran her finger along it. Giving in to her curiosity, Sarah was surreptitiously reaching for her lipstick when a voice behind her caused her to open her hand and let it drop back into her bag.
"Mum!"
"Shh," Sarah said. Luke hadn't quite got the hang of library etiquette yet.
"At least it's reasonably calm over here." Luke plopped down in the chair next to hers. "There was a group of children running up and down the aisles over by the 500s." He explained as he laid a tall stack of books down on the table.
"Keep your voice down." Sarah grinned at her son to soften the reprimand.
"Why? They're not being quiet." He indicated the kids who were indeed playing tag in the stacks.
"People are trying to study and I'd like to think my son was better behaved than they are." Sarah turned back to the article she was trying to read. The paper had browned considerably and she had to struggle to make out some of the words.
"Nobody's trying to study, mum." Aside from the children in the aisles, the staff and a lone woman at the computers watching something on YouTube with her headphones on, they were the only people in the library.
Sarah was about to reply that she was, when the doors were flung open.
A tall man in tweed strode in. "I was concentrating," he said tersely, spinning something that looked like a sonic screwdriver in his hand.
"Doctor?" Sarah asked, though she already knew the answer. "What are you doing here?"
"Trying to land. Think I got it a bit wrong. You haven't seen Amy and Rory, have you? Lovely girl, about yea high," He indicated a level about an inch or so above his own height. "Ginger hair. Pale skin. That's Amy. Rory's not quite so lovely and he's got brown hair." He managed to make this sound like a personal affront.
"Nope. Perhaps they wandered off," Sarah replied. "Humans do that sometimes." He'd always complained when she did that.
"Not likely. I, um, seem to have landed around the library. I don't think they'd have left the TARDIS," The Doctor started wandering around peering into the stacks and nearly tripping on one of the children. "Does your Mum know where you are?"
This left Sarah with a clear view through the open door, and she could see the console where the road had been. She shook her head fondly. It was typical, really.
Luke had already wandered off after the Doctor, and Sarah sighed. She couldn't fix the console without the Doctor's help, but she wondered if Amy were in some part of the TARDIS that the Doctor hadn't checked.
She'd just started towards the door when a redhead matching the Doctor's description burst in almost the same way as the Doctor had just moments before. "Are you Amy?"
"I might be," the girl said with a distinct Scottish accent. She looked around. "Somehow, when the Doctor said there was a library in the TARDIS, this wasn't what I expected. Is there a swimming pool in here?"
"Not the last time I checked." Sarah grinned. "The Doctor was looking for you, and for someone called Rory?"
"I'm right here," the young man had come in right after Amy, and Sarah hadn't even noticed him, but it wasn't hard to tell that he was the sensible one of the group.
"Okay, let's go find the Doctor and sort this out," Sarah said, heading back towards the children's area and just assuming they would follow. Her right hand was tucked in the pocket of her jeans and wrapped around her sonic lipstick, but she didn't feel the need to bring it out just yet.
"Wait just a moment," Rory said. He hadn't moved. "Who are you anyway and how did you get in the TARDIS?"
When Sarah turned to answer, she noted that Amy had started following her without question but had stopped when Rory spoke. "Sarah Jane Smith. I used to travel with the Doctor. And I ended up in the TARDIS because a certain Time Lord can't drive that thing as well as he claims to."
Amy snorted. "Did you know he leaves the parking brake on because he likes the sound?" she offered.
"No, but it doesn't surprise me." Sarah chuckled. "I won't ask how you learnt that."
This seemed to be enough for Rory, as he crossed the space in a few long strides, then passed them. Sarah and Amy followed him into the children's area to find Luke and the Doctor at work on a pink and purple toy castle in the centre of the room.
"Ah, there you are." The Doctor looked up at them absently before continuing with his work. "I was afraid I might have materialised you inside the walls of the library. I think I may have found the problem. The dimensional field parameters seem to be off," he added. "Luke could you pass me the cassian spanner? And Rory, I believe there's a flat-head screwdriver at your right foot."
Rory reached down to pick it up. "Is there anything we can do, besides hand you tools? And why would you need a manual screwdriver when you have a sonic one?"
"Not likely," Sarah said. "Somehow that always ended up being my job too." The Doctor might have glared at her, but there was a pink plastic panel between the two of them and she couldn't see his face. She decided this was a good thing.
"Very sensitive to sound vibrations, this." He abruptly jumped up and started pacing, running his hands through his already tousled hair. "Right, this isn't working. It isn't just the dynamic parabola that's off. What could it be? Think. Think. Oh, I know. Sarah, I need you to go back to the console and reset the hyperbolic field regulator. You do remember how to do that."
She nodded.
"Amy, you go with her and hand her tools," he continued with a broad grin. "You might learn something in the process. Sarah did. Luke can help me. Sarah give Rory your mobile number so we can keep in touch. Try zeroing all three axes and if that doesn't work, adjust it by feel. Rory, leave the mobile with me, and check on those children. I don't want them straying out of the library and into the TARDIS proper."
"Got it," Sarah recited her mobile number for Rory, grabbed Amy's hand and ran back through the library, ignoring the scandalised stares of the librarians and stray patrons.
The console looked very different to what she was used to, but the trip back after the last Dalek invasion had proved that the change in appearance wasn't much more than cosmetic. After a moment to get her bearings, she grabbed the tool chest from inside one of the roundels and got to work.
There were a few stops and starts when she had to pull her head out of the console interior to show Amy which tool she meant, but that wasn't surprising. It had taken Sarah at least a year to master them all and she was mechanically minded.
"How do you know the Doctor?" Amy asked after she handed Sarah the triciscate adjuster.
"I thought he was responsible for a series of kidnappings so I snuck into the TARDIS looking for evidence and ended up in the Middle Ages," Sarah replied, her voice muffled by the console. She suddenly realised why the Doctor rarely appeared to be listening when he was working on the TARDIS. "What about you?"
"I met him for the first time when I was seven," Amy started. "He climbed out of this blue box claiming he'd been in the swimming pool in the library. Or something like that." She went on to tell the story of their first meeting and their second. "And I just got fed up and grabbed his tie and slammed a car door on it until I got some answers."
Sarah laughed. "I've been tempted to do that a few times. May have even done it once or twice. It was much easier when he used to wear that long scarf. Could you pass me the level?" She sat up to get a breath of fresh air while she could. As Amy handed it to her, Sarah's mobile rang.
Amy picked it up from where it was lying on the floor and started to pass it to Sarah.
"Just put it on speaker." She wasn't sure how the reception would be under the console.
Amy did as she was told. "Sarah, I need you to adjust the manifold projector to .33a47&l and then tighten the camble nut as tightly as you can."
Sarah grabbed the camble spanner and lay back down to work. "Doctor, the post-vertal level spring is loose. Should I tighten that too?"
"That might be why she was wobbling so much in free flight. Good call."
Sarah finished the adjustments and felt a ripple run through the floor. Sitting up, she discovered that the road had disappeared, leaving just the console room and Amy.
"That's done it." The Doctor strode through the console door. "The dimensions of the TARDIS have stabilised and we can continue our hunt for the fnarg."
"We can give you a hand with that," Luke offered, ignoring his mother's look.
"Thanks, but didn't the Shadow Proclamation confine you to Earth?" the Doctor replied, winking at Sarah. "We'll work that out once your mother decides you're old enough to leave Earth."
As this had been Sarah's plan all along, she didn't object. "We'd best get back to our research then. Pleased to meet you Amy and Rory. I'm sure we'll meet again." She hugged Amy, shook hands awkwardly with Rory, and then allowed the Doctor to give her a big hug, grateful that this one didn't lift her off the floor when he did so. She waited for Luke to finish his goodbyes, and then led him out the door to the library garden, where they watched the TARDIS disappear with a wheezing groan.
"Clyde and Rani will be so disappointed they didn't come with us," Luke said with a disproportionate amount of glee, but Sarah understood the impulse behind it and just smiled.
It wasn't until they were settled back at their books that Sarah remembered that she'd meant to ask the Doctor about the crack that wasn't a crack. But when she looked back at the bound volume of newspapers, it was gone as if it had never been.