Brendan Richards Brendan Richards started life as an alien baby , Bray Dun , a member of the Terrae , who lived on the Moon in 1969 . He was rescued by Patricia Richards , and with the help of Anne Travers and Colonel Lethbridge - Stewart his species was saved . However , by that point Bray Dun had began to take on a human physiology , and so he was given over to Richards . She officially adopted him and he was given the name Brendan Richards . It was said that for a short while he would age differently to human babies , but that would eventually settle down to a normal human rate of growth . ( PROSE : " Moon Blink " ) By the late 1970s , he became the ward of Lavinia Smith . He first met Lavinia ' s niece , Sarah Jane Smith , during a school break on 18 December 1981 . He and Sarah Jane promptly opened the crate that had been sent to her by the Fourth Doctor in 1978 and discovered K9 Mark III . Two days later , he was kidnapped and nearly sacrificed by the Hecate Cult in Moreton Harwood but was saved by Sarah Jane and K9 . Lavinia once told Sarah Jane that she had invested in Brendan ' s education so that he would not believe everything that he read in the newspapers . He attended Wellington College but sought to convince Lavinia to allow him to attend the local comprehensive school in Moreton Harwood as he did not like boarding . He had a close friend at Wellington named Travis , whose father was in the market gardening business . Lavinia ' s estate also included a market garden . He was taking three extra O - Levels during the 1981 - 1982 academic year : Additional Maths , Physics and Biology . Having a keen interest in computer technology , he was extremely impressed by K9 and his computational abilities . Although the original K9 unit had been built by Professor Marius in the year 5000 , Brendan was nevertheless familiar with many of the components used in his construction . As Lavinia was then in the United States , he , Sarah Jane and K9 spent Christmas Day 1981 with Howard and Juno Baker , whom Sarah Jane had mistakenly believed had been part of the Hecate Cult only four days earlier . ( TV : " A Girl ' s Best Friend " ) After this happened , Sarah , Brendan , Lavinia and K9 continued to investigate and stop other cults and witchcraft covens present in Britain . ( PROSE : " Powerstone " , " The Shroud of Azaroth " , " Hound of Hell " , " The Monster of Loch Crag " , " Horror Hotel " , " The Curse of Kanbo - Ala " ) He had a deep , honking laugh . ( TV : " A Girl ' s Best Friend " ; PROSE : " The Sow in Rut " ) Sarah believed that he had many irritating habits . ( PROSE : " The Sow in Rut " ) In the late 1980s and early 1990s , Brendan studied at the University of Cambridge . ( PROSE : " Housewarming " ) After he returned , he assisted Sarah and K9 in investigating a supposedly demonic pig spirit . When K9 became possessed by this spirit , Sarah worked out a way of exorcising it by electrocuting K9 , defeating it . ( PROSE : " The Sow in Rut " ) His computer skills eventually led to him getting a job in Silicon Valley , near San Francisco . He was unable to attend Lavinia ' s funeral as a result of his work in California . ( AUDIO : " Comeback " ) In 2008 , he was still working in Silicon Valley . He got a job in a software development company . ( PROSE : " The Lost Boy " ) In 2009 , Brendan was running an ecology project in San Francisco with Mike Yates . He was invited to Sarah Jane Smith ' s aborted wedding with Peter Dalton , but couldn ' t make it so fast because he was in the United States . ( PROSE : " The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith " )