I have been recced!

[kerravonsen]

Whee! I was wondering why I was getting comments for Tempus Fugit (see also on my fic site) when it was posted a couple of years ago, and apparently it has been recced as one of a series of recs celebrating awesome female characters: http://siljamus.dreamwidth.org/113098.html

Yay!

It makes me want to write more about those two, except for this BIG problem: Carter would NEVER agree to travel with the Doctor, because she would consider it a dereliction of duty, an absence-without-leave. And it's no good saying "oh, make it like with Tegan and have him pick her up and then find it impossible to get her back to the right place-and-time" because she's so tech that she'd insist on helping to mend the TARDIS to fix whatever the flaw was that was preventing her return.

So I can't think of any GOOD reasons for Carter to stay, and that means I can't make her a companion, and that means I can't write any more.

So do any of you have workable ideas to get around this problem?

Comments

[cheyinka]

Atlantis needs to get flown back to its galaxy, and she's considering going with it so she can be there to solve problems when it arrives, but it'll take a while to get back there. The Doctor suggests that instead of hanging out on the city waiting for it to arrive, or waiting at the SGC for the gate to be available, she go with him for a few months, see more of the universe, and he can drop her off at wherever Atlantis ends up.

She could consider it continuing education! (+ a rest from saving Earth...)

[sinanju]

It seems simple enough. If the Doctor shows up at the SGC (with or without Carter in tow), and they realize (via Carter's reports or just from observing him) how much Carter could learn from hanging around with him...

I don't think a temporary assignment to travel with the Doctor is out of the question. Then it wouldn't be dereliction of duty or being AWOL. It would be her JOB to travel with the Doctor for a while. The SGC's brief IS to find potential allies out there, and the Doctor is certainly a good guy to have on your side....

[persephone-kore.livejournal.com]

I don't know about workable, but suppose your plot revolved around something that was a legitimate interest of both parties? Suppose she got assigned to work with him on it? It doesn't lend itself to very long-term companioning, perhaps, but it would at least support a directed plot.

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

He tells her he can get her home seconds after they leave?

[kaffy_r]

My first thought was similar to everyone else's: have her seconded, for a (linear) 12-month period of time; that could be plenty of time for adventure.

As for the whole military/ewww thing with the Doctor, perhaps the Doctor's distaste for the military doesn't need to be quite as pronounced as it might seem to outsiders. Despite everything he said, and no matter how loudly he said it, he appreciated many UNIT officers and enlisted folks during his time as Three. He might drive the bargain that Carter's secondment would be for purposes of cultural and political observation, *not* for the purposes of figuring out time travel. (I'd imagine that Jack might snort and say "no, we'll figure out time travel on our own, thanks; if we want that kind of trouble, let it be our own fault, what do you think of that?" And Ten might appreciate that.)

You could also do a bit of business in which the Doctor does manage to bring Carter back to two minutes after she leaves ... only she's not impressed, having already been with him for six months of the 12 month period, and pretty much echoes Jack's "Oh, no, I want nothin' to do with travel!" attitude.

[sallymn.livejournal.com]

While she's unquestionably brilliant (I may dislike her, but I'm not blind :) I really doubt she could fix something a Time Lord couldn't... so we could have heaps of fun with her insisting of mending it, thinking she's got it right... and finding out she hasn't when they end up on Planet Omigodwherearewenow????

Just about any of the Doctor's reaction to that would be even more fun :)

Alternately, one of the little souvenirs the Doctor picked up on his travels, somewhere in the bowels of the TARDIS, turns out to be a quantum mirror...

[dreamflower]

Or: she gets stranded somewhere the other side of a Stargate, and is surprised to be rescued and picked up on the other side of nowhere by this fellow she met once on Earth at a scientific conference -- in his blue box which is bigger on the inside than the outside.

Whatever difficulties led to her stranding might also have led to TARDIS difficulties in returning her straightaway.

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

Sam would be MIA and want to get back from that scenario.
I suppose getting her back could become "interesting" if the TARDIS got damaged from say a Glider shot.

What if Carter was supposed to have been killed or captured but wasn't , thanks to the Doctor's intervention? Time paradox and its resolution might make an interesting story.