A/n: So most of this fic is just what I think the Inspector Spacetime version of the 9th Doctor episode (season 1 of the reboot, episode 9) The Empty Child would be like, which according to the Inspector Spacetime TV Tropes page, it's called The Cambaire Machine.
And yes, there is a TV tropes for Inspector SpaceTime, which I have also taken some names from (though I just guessed at Lily and got it right). Read it if you dare- it has really gone into depth about this pastiche, and is hilarious. I intend to take full advantage of it, though I have definitely deviated from the "accepted" Inspector Spacetime canon, mostly because I liked the idea of Constable Reggie playing the Rose character, and I liked the idea of the Captain Jack character being female.
So, timeline-wise, this is set sometime after Community Episode 3x16, probably the summer after their Junior year, but before they take the Dreamatorium down.
Also, I own neither Community, Inspector Spacetime, or Doctor Who.
Lastly, this has not been beta'd, and thus I would appreciate any feedback on character, plot, or really, just whatever constructive criticism you can give me.
The Cambaire Machine
Chapter One
"I always have to be Geneva. Why can't I play Lily from the reboot? She's so much cooler. Or Marianne, the companion of Inspectors Three and Four?" Annie asked-whined. "She's even got part of my name right."
Abed paused, cocking his head slightly.
Geneva was a fellow Infinity Knight, like the Inspector, and she was from the classic series, so she had never shared the DARSIT with Constable Reggie. But Reggie was part of the Reboot too, so… "You could play Lily, if you want," he pursed his lips, "but then I'd have to play Inspector number 9. I don't think I have enough leather."
"You're telling me that you can reimagine the entire space-time continuum, but a leather jacket is too difficult?" she teased, leaning just a tad closer to him across the kitchen counter. "Or I suppose we could call Britta and ask to borrow one of hers…"
"Or you can just borrow mine," Troy's head popped out of the blanket fort, quickly disappearing to be replaced by a leather jacket hurtling out of the opening. Abed caught it out of the air easily.
"Since when have you been the leather jacket type, Troy?"
The young man's head popped out of the blanket fort again. He looked slightly embarrassed. "Since the year I went as Blade for Halloween," he defended. "And it was awesome."
"Hey, we could do that this year. Blade Trinity," Abed said. The slightly widening of his eyes belied his excitement. "I could be Hannibal King, and Annie could be Abigail, Whistler's long lost daughter."
"Is that the vampire movie again?" Annie asked, genuinely confused.
Troy and Abed looked at each other instantly and had one of their little telepathic conversations. Finally, they nodded in unison. "We're going to have a Blade marathon then, tonight," Troy said, his tone brooking no argument.
"But first, Dreamatorium," Abed added, turning back to Annie, who was beaming in amusement. She didn't particularly care about comics or their movie interpretations, but if the boys were going to include them in their fun, she wasn't going to say no. "Go get changed, we'll meet you in five minutes."
A spur of excitement propelled Annie into her room and she dug into her closet, flinging clothes left and right. It made her a little anxious to leave the contents sprawled over her bed, but she could always clean up after, besides, she thought, tidying would be just the thing to ground her in reality after all the imaginary adventures.
She extracted the T-shirt she had bought a few days ago, just in case they'd let her play Lily, a silk screen with the British flag, a leather bomber jacket Britta had given her for her birthday, boots with just a bit of heel and a pair of tight black jeans. She looked in the mirror as she placed the reasonable approximation of Lily's hat for that episode rakishly on her head. She had to admit, Lily looked a lot like Britta, though the real Lily had been ginger.
She made sure to do her eye makeup bright and bold – Lily always had mascara on no matter the adventure, and she always looked fantastic. That, the chunky mod bracelet and the water pistol she had spray-painted silver completed the ensemble. When she looked in the mirror again, she didn't see sweet, excitable Annie, but the rakish and charming Lily who just happened to have dark brown hair.
"Absolutely splendid," she quipped Inspector Nine's catchphrase. The greatest thing about Lily was that she was from The Future, and thus didn't have a British accent, so she wouldn't be making a complete fool of herself. Despite all the practice, her accent still sounded more Cockney than anything else, and was full out ridiculous. Sometimes Troy couldn't keep from laughing.
She strode out of her bedroom, to find the Inspector and his loyal Associate standing in the living room, looking bored, but their faces transformed as they caught sight of her.
"Hello boys," she grinned in the most Lily-ish way she could muster, confident with a hint of the seductive. It was easier than she thought it would be, because her roommates were definitely looking at her in appreciation. Well, Troy was. Abed was as impassive as ever.
Lily hadn't been one for extremely revealing clothing, though her T-shirt had a scoop neck low enough for some cleavage, and there was that one episode at the end of the Ninth Inspector's run where she'd been naked for a bit, but everything she wore had been tight.
"Professor Lillian Taylor reporting for duty."
"Cool," Inspector Abed said with a nod. He looked every inch Inspector Nine, leather jacket, jeans, dark colored T-shirt underneath, and Troy looked dashing in his Constable costume.
"Yeah, very cool," he grinned at her, and Annie rolled her eyes.
"So, I've given this some thought, and I think we should do the Cambaire Machine, the first episode Professor Lily appeared in. Both parts, if there's time." Abed said, taking the lead as always. "Ready?" His friends nodded, and he straightened visibly, and got into Inspector-mode: fearless and British.
"Splendid."
Constable Reggie was clinging to the top of a runaway hovercraft, slipping just a little further down every second. The hovercraft was zipping over the city of New New London, in the midst of the Third System war, between the citizens of New Earth and the Reichians of Deutchon Five, who had an almost religious hate for the human race, and aimed to wipe them off the face of the galaxy.
Just as he was about to slip off, he was caught in mid-air as if he were about to belly flop into a pool by what appeared to be a tractor beam, a waving liquid shine in bright purple. A female voice piped in out of nowhere. "Hang tight there, boyo. I've got you."
"Who's got me?" Reggie wailed, "And, you know, how?"
"I'm just programming your coordinates into the computer. I'll have you down in a jiff. Just stay as still as you can and keep your legs and arms inside the beam at all times."
"Coordinates?" Reggie asked, but the voice acted like she hadn't heard him.
"Oh, and can you turn off your cellphone, pretty please? Seriously, the radiation it emits mucks with the machinery."
"Oh, come on. Nobody ever believes that." The Constable muttered, but he pulled out his U-Phone and turned it off.
"That's much better dear, thanks."
"Yeah, I'm sure. Everything's fantastic now. I'm hanging in the sky during the middle of an alien attack on a planet I've never been to before in a uniform from another century! But it's okay, because my cell phone is off!" Reggie screamed, once again on the verge of panic.
"Just a second," the voice sang, and a long, panic-stricken second later she piped in again. "Alright, I've got it. Now hold on tight!"
"To what?!"
"Hm. Fair point."
Reggie began sliding down the tractor beam like it was some freaky ethereal waterslide, and he screamed at the top of his lungs, sure that he was going to slip out and continue his fall onto the city of New New London and he'd never see the Inspector or his girlfriend Minnie again.
But at the last second there was a disorienting flash of light, and he found himself in the arms of a very attractive woman, in what appeared to be a space ship. "You're fine," she was saying to him, straining slightly under his weight. "You're just fine. The tractor beam tends to disorient, but you're fine." She set him on his feet, supporting him with one arm.
As he got his breathing and nausea under control, the Constable took in his rescuer. She had to be somewhere in her early to mid-twenties, with disarmingly blue eyes. Her dark hair fell over her leather-clad shoulders in waves. She arched an eyebrow at him, but smiled becomingly, and Reggie found it a bit difficult to breath normally in a way that had nothing to do with his harrowing adventure.
"Um… hi," he said, with what he hoped was a charming grin.
The lady let her eyes rake over him and her grin turned suggestive. "Hello."
"Hello." She just stared and he shook his head, heat rushing to his face. "Sorry, said that already."
"Are you okay?"
"Oh, yeah. Just fine, me. Get into these predicaments all the time. What, are you expecting me to swoon?"
"It's just, you look a bit dazed there."
"Hey, you're the one that's gone all fuzzy…" Reginald's eyes rolled back as he fell forward, and the leather-clad woman had to catch him before he hit the metal floor.
Meanwhile, the Inspector had found his way into a mansion, following a small troop of burglars in sleek cybernetic cat-suits inside. The owners had been evacuated to a moon-base weeks ago, just in case the Reichians succeeded in the conquest of New Earth. It was really only a matter of time before someone tried to break in.
The Inspector watched as the small cadre of burglars cut through the positronic force field with a specialized device, and use a small dimensional transistor to get through the neutronized glass. It took only a short time, and soon they were slipping like shadows inside the large building. The Inspector slipped in after them.
"Blimey, look at all this stuff," one of the men said, looking at his leader, the young lady who had confronted the Inspector in the alley earlier that night. "Some of this must be off the black market."
"It doesn't matter where they got it," she snapped at him. "Only that it's ours now."
"Yes, I'm sure it could fetch quite a lot on the interplanetary market," The Inspector said softly.
The thieves whipped around to face them, activating their laser swords, but their leader stopped them with a wave of her hand. "It's alright. He's not meant to be here either." She took a step forward, lifting her goggles up and placing them on her head.
"So. A gang of thieves, are you? Striking at the abandoned homes of the rich during an attack, so the police and military will be too busy to respond to any calls for help from an empty house. But why? Surely you're not starving. That's up to the minute technology in your hands, to be able to cut through anti-invasion fields and all the other anti-thievery devices that are sure to be in place."
"No, we're not poor," one of the thieves said, stepping forward. He and the rest of his crew powered their swords down at the nod of their leader and he went on. "But the people we give all the profit to are."
"Oi, Jameson, knock it off. He could be a bobby." His mate said, cuffing the first man behind the head.
"No, I'm not part of your police force," the Inspector said, a small sneer appearing on his face. "If I were, you'd all be incapacitated by now. So, you lot are latter-day Merry Men, then? Stealing from the rich and giving to the poor?"
"Not like these lot deserve anything," the first thief said, ignoring the glare from his friend. "Leaving the first sign of trouble, but locking their valuables away from them that could use them. You know where our profit goes to? Straight to the families of those who are fighting this bleeding war, defending our planet, and to the veterans the government ain't paying properly." He punctuated his small speech with a nod.
The Inspector's eyes traveled from him to their young leader, scrutinizing her. She must have been younger than all of them, yet they followed her lead without qualm. "How noble of you. Marxism in action, really."
The young woman frowned. "Why did you follow me here? What do you want?"
"I want to know how that thinggot into my DARSIT. Especially considering how it didn't have a key," annoyance slipped into the Inspector's voice, though his face betrayed nothing. "You seem to be the one to ask."
"I did you a favor. I told you not to go in that tourist contraption. And that's all I can tell you," her mouth formed a hard line, and the Inspector nodded.
"I appreciate it, then. Now, I'm also looking for a young man in a 21st century Constable's uniform. A specific one," he went on, a small amused smile quirking his lips, "I didn't just happen to have a craving." The two thieves laughed, but their leader's frown deepened.
"Sorry," she said sarcastically, "haven't seen anyone like that around. Now, is there anything else you need before you leave?"
"Thanks for asking. I'm looking for something – a weapon, a piece of technology that would far surpass even yours. It should have materialized out of nowhere a few weeks ago – I caught it jumping through timelines…" The Inspector dug around in his pockets to produce a pen and paper. "It would have appeared somewhere conspicuous, so the military couldn't have covered it up, though not for lack of trying." He began drawing on the small pad of paper, an approximation of a cylinder. "Would have looked something like this."
He finished his rather shoddy drawing and passed it to the young woman, her compatriots peering over her shoulders. She took one look and handed it back to him roughly.
"I…"
A sound like thunder clapped behind them, and the Inspector wheeled around quickly
He heard the young woman swallow. "Did you remember to put the positron field back up?" She asked her associate roughly.
"Honey? Honey?" a disembodied voice, deep and rich and male, sang from nowhere. "Is that you, honey? Hon-ey."
The Inspector watched as the young woman surged forth, a look of terror on her face, but she brought up her small device to the thin invisible skin of the positronic force field, quickly entering a code. A second later, he felt it close like static on his skin.
"What is it? What's going on? Having a disagreement with one of your fellow thieves, Robin?"
"It's not one of us," she said quickly. "It's not even human."
"Hon-ey…"
Her eyes went wider. "It can't, can it?" She wondered out loud, but she shook her head, and then wheeled around to face her men. "Alright, we're getting out of here. We'll slip through the house and exit through the back gardens."
"But we haven't got…"
"There's no time for that. Come on, move!" She started running, grabbing her dufflebag off the floor and setting off towards the back of the house. Her men followed her, looking as confused as the Inspector felt.
He let them go, more interested in the new apparition then in where the erstwhile thieves were headed.
The voice spoke again. "Hon-ey. Honey, is that you? Will you let me in dear?"
The Inspector went towards the front door, and peered out. "Don't!"
He looked back to see the young woman, standing across the room, as if she didn't dare to come any closer. "Don't what?"
"Don't go out there. Don't let him get you."
The Inspector frowned. "What happens if he 'gets me?'"
"He feeds off of you," she replied, her blue eyes wide and wild. "He feeds off of your energy, and you become like him. All empty inside. Now come on!"
There was another crack of what sounded like thunder, and the Inspector felt the positronic field flicker and fade.
"That's him," she said, voice going soft. "He can disrupt energy fields, walk through force fields like they're not even there. Walls, too, given enough time." Her face went stubborn. "I'm leaving with my boys, right out through the back. If you have any sense you'll do the same." With that, she fled out of the entryway.
The Inspector turned back towards the entrance, patting his pocket softly to make sure he had the quantum spanner on him. It clicked softly against his optic pocketknife he applied pressure, and he nodded to himself. Come what may, he was prepared. He went toward the door and opened it, ever so slightly.
"Hon-ey. Hon-ey. Are you there honey? Let me in. I want to make sure you're alright."
"Whoever you're calling for," the Inspector shouted, sticking his head out of the crack. There – he could make out a silhouette on the sprawling lawn. From what he could tell, it was a man, probably middle aged. "He or she isn't here."
"Honey? Are you there, honey?"
"Sorry to say, your 'honey' is not. Nobody here but us chickens," the Inspector smiled to himself at the reference. He leaned forward a little. "So, Mr. Mysterious Silhouette. Why were they so frightened of you? What have you done to strike such terror into the hearts of other human beings?"
He received no answer, and by the time he had opened the door all the way and stepped out into the crisp New New London night, the shadow-man had gone without a trace.