Calufrax

My penultimate rec is, like my ultimate one, for a Big Bang fic!

Story: Beyond The Yellow Brick Road
Author: pluto
Rating: All Ages
Word Count: 23849
Author's Summary: Years after her adventures in the TARDIS, Martha Jones is haunted by the Doctor as she investigates an alien crash site.
Characters/Pairings: Jack Harkness, Martha Jones, Mickey Smith, The Doctor (10th)

Recced because: It's a thoughtful and occasionally moving look at Martha, Mickey and Jack years after their travels with the Doctor. It shows Martha at her best: clever, compassionate, thoughtful and occasionally stubborn. (And I adore the idea of Martha treating humans who're stupid enough to get alien headcolds because they don't take sufficient precautions!)

Glancing up from her notes as she stands at the podium, Martha glimpses brown hair and a blue-suited shoulder. After her dream that morning, she immediately thinks Doctor, her breath catching in her throat.

She tells herself that blue suits and brown hair aren't especially uncommon. Besides, the Doctor she knew is gone: years ago, she and Mickey intercepted the UNIT reports of a new regeneration spotted. And she'd known even before that, hadn't she? Known it in her heart that he was dying when she saw him last, known it like she had been punched in the gut.

She fusses with her notes until she's recomposed herself, and when she looks up, there's no Doctor, just a dozen dozen restless faces, staring up at her.

From travelling the galaxy to defending the Earth to hunting aliens to this, she thinks, scanning the room. Working for herself under the banner of Jones Xenobiological Consulting, Martha's in high demand in the field of xenopathology, though she finds most of this plays out as treating people who've caught alien head colds (and the odd STD--she doesn't ask) from investigating crash-landed artifacts.

Story: Planar Flight
Author: jinxed_wood
Rating: All Ages
Word Count: 12189
Author's Summary: It's 1913, and The Farringham School for Boys is haunted by ghosts. Martha suspects foul play, especially when another Doctor arrives on the scene.
Characters/Pairings: Martha Jones, The Doctor (10th), The Doctor (8th),

Recced because: I am a sucker for stories featuring Martha and other Doctors than Ten, but especially for ones featuring Eight and Martha. I'm also a sucker for stories set during Martha and the Doctor's stay in Farringham in 1913. This combines both marvellously and imaginatively.

Martha staggered forward, into the TARDIS. “Phew, you had me going there for a moment–” She froze and looked around her, her eyes taking in the gothic architecture, and the dripping candelabras. A sagging cosy armchair stood to one side of the console, looking ridiculously out of place. Martha eyed the tea cup perched on a footstool beside it. Steam still curled up from its contents.

“Do you want a cup?” a chipper voice asked. “The pot is still fairly fresh.”

“You’re not going to suddenly materialise out of the walls, are you?” Martha asked, momentarily unsure.

“Does that have any bearing on the actual question?”

“Yes, actually, I think it might,” Martha said, a little more firmly. “How the hell did you get in here?”

“Me? Why, I live here,” the voice said.

Here's the first of this week's several multi-era stories:

Story: Evolution
Author: Concordiaadieu/catholicphoton
Rating: Adult
Word Count: 30094
Author's Summary: Set Post-JE. Martha goes missing, and panic ensues.
Characters/Pairings: Francine Jones, Gwen Cooper, Ianto Jones, Jack Harkness, Jack Harkness, Martha Jones, Mickey Smith, The Doctor (10th), Torchwood, UNIT

Recced because: It's a rolicking good adventure romp with a creative use of Martha's backstory and a Classic Who enemy who not many fic authors have bothered to bring into New Who stories.

“Doctor, what is that? Can it find Martha?”

“It detects disturbances to the fabric of space-time, so hopefully yes.”

Jack cleared his throat. “I’ve got one of those too, only mine’s sleek and sexy.”

“Jack, stop it. Now assuming that the disturbance you detected earlier with your sleek, sexy and, by the way vastly inferior, detector thingy is connected to Martha’s disappearance, and in all honestly signs point to yes, then with this massively superior detector thingy not only can I detect it, but I may be able to trace where it came from and where it went. The when may be a little trickier.”

Jack shrugged and grabbed Gwen’s hand as the Doctor took off at a run toward the disturbance. Jack snorted. “He could have just asked where we got the reading, but no, he likes run.“

Gwen grinned at him. “You’re one to talk.”

This week I intend to share the Martha love and the Donna love about equally. Some fics will be short, one is very long.

Enjoy !

Story: Lifelines
Author: jinxed_wood
Rating: Teen
Word Count: 23077
Author's Summary: Martha needs to spread the message but, in order to do that, she needs to stay alive - something Derek Reese is very good at. (Crossover with The Sarah Connor Chronicles and set during the year-that-wasn't.)
Characters/Pairings: Martha Jones, Derek Reese (SCC)
Warnings: Swearing

Recced because: I'm a sucker for YTNW stories and this one is excellent. Don't worry if you've never seen The Sarah Connor Chronicles - I haven't, and I still thoroughly enjoyed this well written story. I love the way jinxed_wood develops the relationship between Derek and Martha from his initial distrust and almost-dislike of her, through to a strong friendship.

The stranger cursed under his breath. "Great, just great," he said, as he swung up onto the manhole ladder and closed it.

"It’s okay, it's gone," Martha said.

"Not for long," the stranger said grimly, as he clicked on a torch, and drove a bolt home on the manhole… a bolt?

"Since when do manholes have bolts locks?" Martha asked.

The stranger gave her a look, as if she'd asked why was the sky blue "We'll need to move fast," he said. "They won't come down here on their own, not anymore, but they will travel in packs, and we'’ll want to be somewhere else when that happens."

"We do?" Martha’s eyes had become accustomed to the light of his torch. He was tall, wide shouldered, and moved like he'd been doing this for years. "You’re military?" she asked.

He looked at her. "It knew your name," he said. "I've never heard one of those things call a human by its name before."

Martha sighed wearily. "Yeah, it'’s a long story."

"Is it the kind of story that'’s likely to get me killed?" he asked. He grabbed Martha by the elbow and steered her down the sewer tunnel. Martha let him; it wasn't as if she knew where they were going. Which reminded her…

"Where are we going?"

"You'll know when we get there," he said tersely.

"Why won't you tell me now?"

"So you won't blab if we get caught before we reach it."

This week I intend to share the Martha love and the Donna love about equally. Some fics will be short, one is very long.

Enjoy !

Story: Masquerade
Author: radiantbaby
Rating: All Ages
Word Count: 5978
Author's Summary: After the events in 1913 at Farringham, the Doctor takes Martha to a ball, where she meets a mysterious stranger.
Characters/Pairings: Martha Jones, The Doctor (10th)

Recced because: This is a fairly straight forward story, and you'll probably get the "twist" quite early on, but that's not the point. The point is that *Martha* doesn't catch on and it's interesting to see her reactions to "Ganymede".

The Doctor rushed over to the table of masks, excitedly hopping from one foot to the other. "Ooh, so many choices, so many lovely choices," Martha heard him say to himself as she walked up to stand beside him.

"Ah, perfect!" he suddenly exclaimed, picking up another one of the masks that looked like a bird, this one completely black like a raven. The Doctor held it in front of his face and squawked comically, "Never more, never more!"

Martha laughed.

"Hey, with this ensemble," he gestured to his clothes, "it's a raven or a penguin mask, so I think I will go for a raven, thank you very much."

This week I intend to share the Martha love and the Donna love about equally. Some fics will be short, one is very long.

Enjoy !

Story: The Not-Love Song of Donna Noble
Author: parrotfish
Rating: All Ages
Word Count: 904
Author's Summary: Donna Noble is no Prufrock: She dares. A short character study.
Characters/Pairings: Donna Noble, Martha Jones, The Doctor (10th)

Recced because: parrotfish is another author whom I admire who doesn't write nearly as much fic as I would like, but when she does, she writes beautifully. She captures Donna, Ten and Martha very well here.

"Tea?"

"Tea is a planet?"

"Of course not. Afternoon meal. You know, cucumber sandwiches, scones, Battenberg cakes. I love those cakes. I wonder how they make those little squares all pink and yellow like that?"

"You have the attention span of a hyperactive hummingbird. You know that, don't you?"

"I've been told."

Marvellous Martha Jones

I've been recommending Martha Jones-centric fics all this week and here is my final recommendation - and this time it's a Martha/Ten fic.

Story: Shredded
Author: parrotfish
Author Summary: Past actions bring consequences that are not easy to face. But for the Doctor and Martha, It's a chance to clear the air. "What do you want me to say? That I forgive you?"
Characters: Martha Jones, The Doctor
Rating: Adult
Word count 2455

Recced because: Parrotfish writes beautifully, and her stories about Ten and Martha are very well-observed, and frankly, she should be encouraged to write more !

This is a post-Season 3 fic in which Martha makes good use of her UNIT and Torchwood connections to save the Doctor (yet again) and they come to a new understanding:
The Doctor felt a thread in the complex web of his universe go slack, cut suddenly and hanging loose, death removing it from the pattern of all living things.
Strong hands lifted him, and he shivered as they carried him, dripping with water and blood, and laid him on dry, hard ground.
A face appeared before him, serene and dark, and he was sure he was delirious, because it was more than he deserved.
"What..?" he gasped through bloody teeth.
"Don't try to talk. You're going to be all right," she said in her reassuring way.
He knew it really was Martha Jones in the moment before everything went black.

It's possible the ending will make you melt, and if you like this, be sure to read the sequel: In the Dark (which is even more melting in my view !)

Marvellous Martha Jones

I'm recommending Martha Jones-centric fics all this week but they're not all Martha/Ten.

Story Bombardment of Positive Ions
Author: Carmen Sandiego
Author Summary: Martha Jones and the UNIT Christmas Party.
Characters: Brigadier Lethbridge Stewart, Harry Sullivan, John Benton, Liz Shaw, Martha Jones, Sarah Jane Smith, Second Doctor
Rating: All ages
Word count: 2601

This is a very humorous story about a Christmas get-together of the Doctor's former Companions at the Brig's house with a fair amount of amusingly snarky point-scoring from earlier Companions. And Martha gets to meet the Second Doctor:

Martha looked up. A sprig of mistletoe. Oh. Well she couldn't, obviously. And he -
The Doctor kissed her, and it was soft and gentle and entirely welcome. When he pulled away, Martha looked into his eyes and found no apologies or regrets or excuses. If anything, he looked rather pleased with himself.
"That was...nice," she said, unable to keep the smile from her lips. "Much nicer than last time."
"Last time!" said Jamie, poking his round the door. "Here, Doctor, what's this about then? You dinnae see me going around kissing lassies I've just met. I think you’ve got some explaining to do."

I've read this about 6 times since it was first posted and it makes me laugh every single time.

Marvellous Martha Jones

I'm recommending Martha Jones-centric fics all this week but they're not all Martha/Ten.

Story A Little Shelter
Author: Netgirl_y2k
Rating: All ages
Author Summary: There's a house on Bannerman Road.
Characters: Martha Jones, Sarah Jane Smith, Luke Smith, Clyde Langer
Warnings: None
Word Count: 2233

Recced because: I am a complete sucker for Year That Never Was stories, especially those in which Martha meets up with and is helped by former Companions of the Doctor. In this one Sarah Jane helps Martha with the Doctor's plan; there's also a brief cameo by Ace, which is spot-on, and the whole story is marvellously well-written.

"Where'd you get these?" Ace asked, marvelling at the quality of the forgeries on her return from Wales.
"I met a woman with an alien super computer living in her attic."
"Oh, the usual then."

Marvellous Martha Jones

I'm recommending Martha Jones-centric fics all this week but they're not all Martha/Ten.

I'm starting with the longest story first - everything after this will be significantly shorter.

Story: For Old Time's Sake
Author: ladymako71
Rating: All
Author's summary: Ace enters the TARDIS, mistaking it for her TARDIS and ends up going along with the Doctor, Martha, and Donna to Portsmouth in 1723.
Characters: Donna Noble, Dorothy (Ace) McShane, Martha Jones, The Doctor (10th), The Doctor (7th)
Warnings: None
Word Count: 11790

Recced because: It's an action/adventure that seamlessly integrates Ace into the post-Season 3 Team TARDIS. I love the humour and banter that's shared between the four characters (especially Donna and Ace) and Seven's cameo is lovely too.

The Doctor’s voice trailed off when he saw the petite figure in the doorway. Head to toe in black. Hair pulled back from a cherub face, and the end of a baseball bat sticking out from the pack over her shoulder. "Ace?" Martha watched the myriad of emotions sweep across the Doctor's features and started for the doorway.
"No offence Gorgeous." Ace started, her usual cocksure attitude kicking in full force. "But I'd remember meeting you!" She smirked at the tall slender man staring at her. The look of initial shock on his face dissolving into one of bemusement as he held his hands out like scales.
"Gorgeous...Professor...Professor...Gorgeous." He rattled on weighing each word as he said it. Ace's jaw dropped as the Doctor smiled at her. "Have to admit Ace, I like 'Gorgeous' better." He winked.