Bide-a-Wee (short story)

	First Doctor
	Susan
	Prentice
	Keelmouth, 1933 and 1999
	Anthony Keetch
	Short Trips: Past Tense
	9 April 2004
Short Trips short stories
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You may be looking for the titular guest house.

Bide-a-Wee was the ninth short story in the Short Trips anthology Past Tense. It was written by Anthony Keetch and featured the First Doctor and Susan.

Summary

The Doctor is staying at Mrs Hutchings' guest house, Bide-a-Wee, in Keelmouth while Susan goes camping with some new friends. The Doctor is enjoying his vacation immensely, spending his days exploring, eating ice cream, and socialising with the Major; however, he is aware that he must put an end to the situation sooner or later.

The residents are a typical bunch for 1933, though the Doctor keeps a careful watch on Mr Prentice. However, the calm is broken when a couple, Jeff and Ujwala Atkins, arrive with their son Craig. Most of the residents, including Miss Lanchester, disapprove of the mixed couple and their half-caste son. The Doctor welcomes them and makes friends with Craig. As he questions the couple during dinner, Craig makes some strange statements. When he yells that he wants McDonald's, his father slaps him, to his and his mother's surprise.

That night, before he goes to bed, the Doctor stops outside Mr Prentice's door and warns him to stay away from Craig. However, the Doctor oversleeps next morning, and learns from the Atkins that Craig has gone out with Prentice. The Doctor fearfully runs to the ice cream shop, to find Prentice and Craig happily eating ice cream — not the hostage situation the Doctor expected to find. He sends Craig off to buy a magazine and talks with Prentice.

Prentice admits that he is an alien and that he used to fight evil, but has retired here on Earth. He enjoyed the setting so much that he borrowed temporal technology to fix Bide-a-Wee and Keelmouth in 1933, never changing. The Doctor learns that it is actually 1999 outside Keelmouth. He tells Prentice that he must turn off the technology, but Prentice refuses, claiming that other times on Earth were barbaric and this time is nearly perfect.

That night, the Doctor wakes Prentice in a panic. Craig is suffering from whooping cough, for which there is no cure in 1933. Prentice must turn off the machine so Craig can be cured. As Prentice runs off to begin the process, the Doctor congratulates Craig on his performance.

The Doctor and Prentice finish the work, prepared to send the residents of Bide-a-Wee back to their natural times — but not before the Doctor enjoys one more ice cream.

Characters

• First Doctor
• Susan
• Mrs Hutchings
• Miss Lanchester
• Jeff Atkins
• Ujwala Atkins
• Craig Atkins
• Mr Prentice
• The Major

Worldbuilding

• Craig mentions pizza, his Game Boy, the Teletubbies, McDonald's and the family's Golf automobile.
• The Doctor spends much of his vacation eating ice cream.
• Susan is off camping with some new friends. The Doctor realises that this is the first time they've spent time away from each other.
• The Doctor notes that he doesn't have a prostate.
• The Doctor's body has been letting him down in recent times, as is the cause of his sleep in.
• The Doctor states he is not a Doctor of medicine, and that the human physiognomy is alien to him.

Notes

• When Susan goes off camping on a small island, she goes with four children and a dog, mirroring Enid Blyton's 1942 children's novel, Five on a Treasure Island. At the end of this short story, the connection is made even stronger when Susan mentions "buried treasure and smugglers and wanting to buy herself a good strong torch", inferring the events of The Famous Five novel.

Continuity

• The Doctor assures Susan that they will stay on Earth, but in a later era (to 1933) where the music might be more to her taste. (TV: An Unearthly Child, AUDIO: Hunters of Earth, et al.)