Author's Note: This isn't really a "real" fanfiction. There's no introduction, no guises, no hidden message, no ardent passages of fevered writing or a plot that ran away with me. This is simple writing, right down to its core, and something that I just needed to get out whilst on my hiatus. Whether you read it or not means little to me, but if you do, I hope you enjoy it. I'm also aware that many conventions used here are cliches, but I'm aware of them and I'm not looking to fix them. This is not SRS BSNS. This is fanfic, and right now, my mind just needs to wander. Here's what happens when it does.

Shadows of Mercy
One

In the beaming light of the twin suns orbiting Silranon, very few noticed the whirring engines of the TARDIS as it tucked itself neatly into existence. Fewer still paid attention to the pair who strode out from it in avid banter and those who were curious simply walked on.

"Yes, that was definitely a fantastic year," the Doctor was saying as he pulled the door shut behind him. "France, fifteenth century. Gorgeous."

"Leave it a bit before we visit again, though, yeah?" suggested Rose, who tucked her hair behind her ears as a warm gaze decided to catch it up. "The people were great, but I don't want to smell anything like that until my nose has recovered."

"Ah, you and your sensitive nose. The places I would take you if it wouldn't – "

He stopped and frowned, only just realising where he'd walked out into. The suns above gave a scorching heat, almost instantly demanding a heavy sweat from anyone caught out in it directly. The buildings, however, were tall and offered shade to most of the busy street, the shadow of the building coming together in a peak rather than following its shape – that was what came of having two light sources rather than one, and even for time travellers it was somewhat disorientating.

The street was lined with smooth pavements, the road between them a single, narrow lane. Bubbled vehicles bobbed along it as though being carried along by an invisible stream and either side there walked lines of people, whose clothes were simple and covered only the necessary parts of modesty. They were human, at least at first glance, but the skin had a strange blue hue beneath the natural surface and every person flaunted a head of thick, dark hair. The women were all slighter than the men, their bodies slimmer and paler than the other sex. Their feet, also unlike the men's were bare.

Rose stopped beside the Doctor and took in what the planet had to offer. With a small voice, she said, "Not Earth, then."

The Doctor reached up to the back of his neck, where already a thin layer of sweat had started to form. "Or if it is, it's ... changed. Dramatically. More than was necessary, I would say."

Rose, shielding her eyes, pointed up to the sky. "Got an extra sun, too."

"That too." He opened and closed his mouth, moving his tongue as though trying to rid it of a horrible taste. "Air's more coppery then the atmosphere on Earth as well. Yuck. Be glad your sense of taste isn't as good as your smell."

Pulling a face of distaste, Rose looked back to their surroundings. The TARDIS had landed right in the middle of a street, and all around them people flowed like water, barely even giving them a glance.

Frowning, Rose tugged on the Doctor's arm. "They're all walking one way."

"What?"

"Look!"

Sure enough, the pavement they stood on had people only walking in one direction: towards them. Across the road, shaded more by the building, there were people walking in the other direction. And something else became apparent, too. The buildings, all of them a dazzlingly bright white, all seemed to be of the same ilk. It was an entire street dedicated to clothes, judging by the windows, and not much more.

The Doctor, taking Rose's hand, pulled her across the road into the shade. The heat was still stifling, especially with the masses of people wandering to and fro, but it was better than being in the glaring light of the suns.

"This is very strange," he murmured, looking about them. "I mean – what is this planet? Nothing I've heard of has sweltering heat, scantily clad bodies and streets all of the same shops."

Rose couldn't help a smirk. "You can't know everything, Doctor."

"No," he replied, missing the irony in her voice and responding in complete seriousness, "but I do know an awful lot, and this is just ... weird."

Just then, Rose let out a cry; one of the passers by had crashed straight in to her while walking and, rather than stopping to apologise, he'd barely even looked at her, instead continuing on his way. She stumbled a little and, had the Doctor not reached out to pull her back, she would have fallen into the road.

"Oi!" she shouted after whoever had hit her. "Watch where you're going!"

When faced with a wall of bare backs, none of whom seemed the slightest bit interested in her, it was hard to tell who had even bumped her in the first place. Feeling a little out of sorts, and slightly crushed by the impending heat, she backed against the wall of the shop behind her. It was surprisingly cool.

The Doctor touched her arm. "All right?"

"Yeah," she responded, smiling, but it was a little tight. "Just hot. And, you know, strange place."

"You want to... ?" He inclined his head across the road, where the TARDIS stood proudly in the sun. Against the fresh white of the buildings, and the pale skin of the people on the planet, she stood out rather like a flower in the middle of winter.

Rose shrugged. "We could stay for a bit. Find out what this planet is, at least. If it's one you don't know about, it's got to be worth a look." The look she gave him bordered on flirtatious, her eyes sparkling even in the shade.

"None of that, thank you," he teased back. Then he frowned thoughtfully, staring up the side of the building behind them, its window proclaiming a sale of some kind. "I must have overshot the coordinates when I was trying to get back to your time. Just goes to show, you should always pay attention while driving."

"Doesn't seem to make much odds with you," Rose pointed out casually. "I swear half the time we end up somewhere other than what you say."

"Yes, well, it's very difficult, you know, piloting a TARDIS all on your tod. Meant to be more than just one of me doing the job."

"That's what you always say." Rose grinned; then it faded as she ran a hand over her forehead, her skin glistening with sweat.

"Blimey, Rose." The Doctor came forward, resting the back of his hand against her cheek. "You're boiling. I'm all right, got a self regulating thermostat. We'd better get you out of this heat."

Agreeing on his suggestion, she let him lead her into one of the nearby shops. Immediately a rush of cold air came to meet them and she instantly felt herself begin to cool. Telling the Doctor she was fine, they proceeded to look around.

The parallels with Earth shops were somewhat alarming. It was a clothes shop – all the shops on the street had been – selling attire fit for the weather outside. Though not looking seriously at anything to buy (the TARDIS would more than happily provide anything either of them needed), the Doctor did pull at a bikini-looking outfit and teased Rose about wearing it, given the heat outside. She promptly threw at him something that was little more than a loin cloth which, for some reason, made him blush and they both burst to laughing.

What was odd, though, was the complete silence in the place. Their laughter practically echoed off the walls and once they had calmed down, they noticed all pairs of eyes looking at them queerly. The Doctor cleared his throat, ducking his head as he pretended to examine the next rack of 'clothes'.

"You and I stick out like nobody's business," he murmured to Rose, who had joined him. He met her eye. "All this," he pulled at another article of clothing, "is ridiculous, but if we're going to stay we might need to think about looking the part. For all we know, wearing more than the bare minimum is some kind of offence."

She coloured evidently and dropped her gaze. "Could just go home," she muttered. "No offence, but I don't really want to wander around showing off bits of myself like that. I'm ... well ... " Her eyes briefly lifted to his, where all she saw was an open gaze, and the smallest, tiniest hint of adoration that he seemed to be letting out more often these days. Not being able to bear the look for too long, she looked down to the stone floor again.

"Yes?" the Doctor prompted when she didn't immediately continue.

"The women here, they're a lot – smaller – than... " And, to his dismay, she patted her waist.

"Rose!" he reproached in a low whisper. "Don't you dare, and I mean don't you dare, think about anything like that. Ever. You're gorgeous, and you should know it. Curves in the right places is what – "

He was interrupted by a shrill cry of desperation coming from across the shop. In and instant both he and Rose stood straight, following the sound of where the shout had come from. Near the entrance of the shop, and gathering a small crowd, were a man and woman. The man seemed somewhat irate, but the woman with him was beside herself with tears. She was held firmly in the grasp of two other, large men, their muscles evident from even across the room.

Then, apparently to everyone's surprise, the man stalked out of the shop, leaving the woman behind. She was screaming, crying, desperately trying to fight off her captors; they stood stoic, like statues, not even looking at her. They simply held her steady.

Everyone else in the shop suddenly looked away, shielding themselves from the commotion at the front as they busied themselves with the items on sale.

Rose found herself stalking over to he trio at the door before she could stop herself, and was surprised when she didn't feel the Doctor's firm grip at her arm; he usually tried to stop her intervening with distressing happenings on planets, sparking off about different cultures and rules and how one wrong to a human meant a right to someone else.

But she didn't need the Doctor to stop her this time. She'd barely taken more than a few paces when, before her eyes, the woman clasped between the men's hand vanished. One second she was there, the next, something seemed to ripple through her and all that was left was a slightly smoky residue, dispersing into the air. The guards, as Rose presumed they were, then took their places either side of the shop door again, acting as if nothing at all had occurred.

It had all happened so quickly that Rose herself wasn't sure if she'd seen it properly. The only thing that made her certain was the growing sickness in her stomach.

The Doctor came and stood beside her.

"I think I want to go home now," she said flatly, still staring at the place the young woman had been not seconds before. She then turned to the Doctor, whose face was as hard and grave as though carved from marble. "What happened? What did they do to her?"

He inclined his head just upwards slightly. "I think – they vaporised her."

Rose blinked, then gave a little, nervous laugh. "W-what?"

"That coppery taste, in the air? Gets a thousand times stronger when you vaporise something. Whoever she was, she's been sucked from reality and stuck somewhere else, probably zapped somewhere entirely ethereal. Stolen from reality in the blink of an eye. The coppery taste is the force of the energy dissipating."

The horror of it, mixed with the complacent reaction of the dwellers of the planet, filled Rose with more fear than she cared to show.

"We can't stay here," was all she said.

"No," agreed the Doctor, and they made towards the exit without another word.

From the cool air of the shop, the scorching heat outside seemed doubly intense. They stood in the threshold squinting across the road, searching for the familiar blue of the TARDIS' walls. All they saw, however, was more of the same streets, the same stark buildings reaching up into the heavens and the same streams of people moving up and down the streets.

The space where they had parked the TARDIS was empty.