Author's Note: This is a co-written self inserted work between emptyvoices and Almadynis Rayne dealing with a premise like the Mendela Effect a real phenomenon based on a perspective in theoretical physics. That is hardly the full story but we are not partial to delivering spoilers at this time.
The Mandela Effect is a real theory.
"Where is my TARDIS?" Rebekah Grey demanded. She bit the inside of her cheek in exasperation, gazing at the spot where once it stood.
Thieves! The angry thought rattled in her mind. First it had been her favorite tea tin. The one her father gave to her for Christmas no less. For their last Christmas to be certain.
Now this. Was nothing sacred anymore? The thought completely unnerved her especially so given the times they were living in. She clenched her jaw briefly, taking a deep breath. Had it simply been moved?
"TARDIS?" Staci Newberry was passing by Rebekah's cubicle to address their manager, Tim Martin about her New York property. They both worked in risk analysis for Baypoint Financial, a subsidiary of JP Morgan Bank.
The brunette grimaced at her, wondering if she would understand the reference. Likely not. Staci was in particular more of a Marvel, Star Wars and Sherlock Holmes fan. And although the selfsame writer, Steven Moffat, collaborated on both Doctor Who and Sherlock Holmes did not equate to a parallel fan base.
But still, Staci might remember the object Rebekah was referring to.
"My….um, TARDIS." She started. "Well, a pewter replica of it." She pointed to the top of her filing cabinet where Rebekah's décor was on pivotal display. "It was sitting right next to the pewter flask and the tea Teresa gave me for my birthday last year."
Staci stepped up, flicking a strand of ebony, dark hair away from her eyes while managing to rub them at the same time. She had just returned from being laid up for two days with a migraine and appeared not fully recovered. "What's a TARDIS?" She asked.
"Sorry, British telephone box replica. It would look sort of like that." It was a fairly accurate description. Given the pewter design and workmanship, it would be difficult to distinguish much of a difference to the untrained eye.
Or to those who didn't know the show.
"Sorry, sweetie, I don't remember you having it." Staci's term of endearment was common. She referred to many of her female coworkers in this regard in that comradely tone of workplace affection. It reminded Rebekah a bit of River Song and….
No. She told herself. Difficult though it was to lose a friend, the experience taught her a valuable lesson. She remembered a childhood tale called 'The Giving Tree'. A story about a sentient tree that formed an endearing friendship with a boy, who provided for the child through his entire life in terms of food, shelter and rest.
Rebekah had forgotten the lesson of the tale that one should endeavor to act like the Giving Tree and the consequences had been meted out. She swallowed with difficulty as she returned her attention to Staci.
"But I know you asked about it once or twice. I kept my pens in it because the little top came off and…." She saw Staci's blank expression. "You don't remember?"
"Could maintenance have taken it by mistake?"
"Why would they?" She was askance, looking on the floor, even crawling on her hands and knees to peer under her desk. The smell of copper wiring filled her nostrils, yet she saw no pewter object. But how could that be?
She wouldn't have moved it and the pewter TARDIS was scarcely more than an empty jewelry box. It was nothing to covet and not worth any sort of price to steal. Rebekah picked up her garbage bin and stared at it doubtfully.
Empty. Of course it was empty.
"Forget something?" Tim Martin, her manager, was now talking. Generally an amiable man who could tell a joke in a deadpan manner that many questioned whether he was serious or not. Often, Rebekah could be accused of naiveté that she took his words at face value.
Fifteen years ago, he moved to California for education and work but did not see a reason to move back home regardless of how much he missed his hometown of Comar in the Northwest region of France.
In exchange, he visited the country he loved so greatly twice a year. "Je ne sais pas." She muttered the words, 'I don't know', in French. Sometimes if the mood struck her she would practice the little French she remembered, given it was her dearest wish to acquire a second language skill.
"Her pewter TARDIS." Staci shrugged her shoulders. "Did you make off with it, Tim?"
He smiled furtively. That smile they knew so well where she knew the next words he would contrive to say were simply 'utter crap'. "Oh yes." He jested in mock sincerity. "At night while you were gone and sent it back to France." He sighed and held up his hands. "But then there is nothing for it. C'est la vie."
Rebekah glanced at him and rolled her eyes to know she didn't take his comments seriously.
"No. Really." He wheedled. "I'll find proof…or a picture." He paused. "Yes, a picture of the item but I will expect a small ransom to have it returned safely."
"Right." The brunette agreed in equal sarcasm. "Why don't I pay you that ransom with interest at 2.25%, fixed over thirty years."
"Hmm." Her manager pondered. "We could arrange that but then, I won't be returning the item until the thirty years is complete."
Pressing her lips together briefly, she flung her coat over her chair. "I doubt you'll live that long to enjoy it."
And yes, joking about his age was commonplace even though he appeared only ten years older than her. Perhaps young, middle age but could hardly be acquainted as old.
"Ohhh." Emma teased, who sat in the cubicle behind Rebekah's. A rather constant flirt to any man who managed to make his way to her desk. Even married men weren't off limits. "Calm down you two. Do I have to send you out to go and 'break bread?"
Breaking bread was Tim's philosophy. Rather than having people bicker, their manager would send them out to lunch and with any luck, overcome their personal difficulties.
"If only I ever ate lunch." Rebekah felt the last two years had drained the life out of her and with that, her appetite was not what it was. Sweets tasted abhorrent.
Maybe because she enjoyed those traditions with her father. Pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving. Wine and soufflés at Christmas.
But no, nothing tasted right. Only dry foods could she stomach, like deli sandwiches and smoked salmon. Something had happened. When her father had died, it took her lust for life with him to the grave.
No. She corrected herself despite her clenched jaw. To the pine box used for his urn. She had moved back home, giving up her lease to help her dying father. She sacrificed everything.
She also managed, after spending weeks at a time, to secure a pension that now reverted to her mother since Rebekah was over the age of twenty-two.
She supposed for some reason she thought her mother would use the windfall to bury her father as according to his wishes. But no. She didn't even offer Rebekah a portion of the money to any degree to ensure her father's wishes were carried out. Even 10% would have gone a long way but what did take place was that her mother took the windfall and then insisted that Rebekah pay a good amount of money for rent.
And it was taxing. She loved her mother but she knew that her parent was miserable. How could she have expected anything different?
"A bottle of wine?" Tim suggested but it was at that point that Rebekah had grown thoughtful.
"Not on an empty stomach," she said abstractly as she pulled open her small, blue binder to find the name of the tech support person who assisted her months ago.
She didn't need tech support but he had offered to buy the TARDIS from her. Perhaps, it was a trick. A joke he was playing on her. She didn't think him capable of such immature pranks but then she only met him for him minutes.
"Greg." She said after dialing his extension and hearing his muffled 'hello'. "I'm glad I caught you but I'm missing something. My pewter TARDIS on the filing cabinet. Do you remember seeing it?" She knew for certain he was a fan of Doctor Who and recognized the pewter box right away as a TARDIS rather than the typical red, phone booths that peppered England.
"TARDIS?" He sounded positively blank. "What's a TARDIS?" He asked.
"Greg, seriously. I'm not in the mood for jokes. You remember it. British telephone booth. You wanted to buy it off me."
"I did?"
"Of course you did. My Pewter TARDIS." She felt exasperated, remembering having gone so far as to search for the art vendor online so as to find him a duplicate. But in vain. "From Doctor Who." She prompted, closing her eyes. Her piece so far had appeared to be original.
Until it vanished. She mused.
"Weird name for a show." He seemed thoughtful. "And it involves phone booths?" A pause as he gave the idea some thought. "Let me guess, it's about Russian government and their machinations."
"Wait, what?" She asked. "Russia? Why would it be about Russia?"
"Sounds familiar. Made in the 1960's about Russia during World War-"
"No!" Realization struck her at the error that had been made. "That's Doctor Zhivago. Doctor Who is about a time travel." She bit the bottom of her lip. Was he having her on?
"And it has to do with phone booths. No Deloreans?"
"As in Back to the Future?" Rebekah rolled her eyes. "You're playing with me. I know you are so out with it. Where did you put it?"
"I promise you I don't have it," said Greg. "I wouldn't just swipe it off your desk and-"
"Hey, you two, thought you both should know," Staci started, "Massive attack at a London hospital. Police think multiple causalities to be expected and probably related to terrorism."
Rebekah felt a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach. England had endured its fair share of terrorism with Manchester, London, the surrounding cities and that didn't even count those using the Russian nerve agent. It made her sick to her stomach. She felt her mouth go dry. "How many do they think? Where?"
"Wellington Medical Center," the blonde replied looking down at her phone perplexed. "And that's the problem. They don't expect any survivors."
"It was that bad?" She was struck by the horror at such a calamitous event.
"It's gone." Staci explained as the other employees turned in shock at her statement. "The entire hospital is missing."
Rebekah swallowed as a chill crawled down her spine raising gooseflesh. A hospital gone missing. Where did that sound familiar?
No. She told herself, dictating to her mind that she needed to be logical. There must be some other explanation. I know there is.
But much like her disappearing TARDIS, the vanishing hospital had presided over her workday with equal mystery, both of which she could not explain.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
The vanishing of the Wellington Medical Center was on the news that night but Rebekah wasn't keen on watching the news. She remembered the Grenfell Tower, a location of low income dwellings that burned in London simply out of negligence since due to expired fire extinguishers, no sprinkler system nor a fire inflammable coating on the building exterior, which provided added outrage to the event.
Maybe it's like that. Horrendous the thought may be since seventy-two people died in that fire with some tenants jumping from the top floors of their windows to the unforgiving cement below to escape being burned alive.
Death by burning would be agonizing in contrast to the immediate mercy given with the death by a fall. But she remembered seeing those bodies fall to the ground, certain in their demise and was struck with memory of the tragedy of September 11th. On television, she recalled the people falling for precisely the same reason as the Grenfell Tower and the thud she heard echoed to her core making her positively ill.
Was Wellington Medical Center a tragedy but a fate compounded with more death than the grim crisis at Grenfell?
It wasn't until the morning before she looked up the incident only to barely find a mention regarding the happenstance. Why? She thought to herself.
She was near to giving up when she spotted an article in the The Sun. A magazine known as a tabloid given to sensationalist news with often little bearing on fact. She dismissed such news as not being credible. Rag magazines. She thought. I might as well read the National Enquirer.
Yet still, The Sun insisted the hospital disappeared and within a day it was returned with a little worse to wear. The headline featured in bold.
Are there Aliens Living Among Us?
Read page four to find the whole story of the hospital, which disappeared only to be returned. Only we know the truth.
Rebekah rubbed her eyes, feeling mystified. What became of the story so loudly proclaimed on the news? She pressed her lips together, looking at her Apple Watch. Now she was running late for work. Mystery or otherwise, the matter would have to wait but as she stepped into the midsummer heat of the early morning, she felt distinctly uneasy. It was a calamity just yesterday. Would those in the U.K. simply accept this muted response by the media only to simply find out that the 'terrorist attack' so soon after Manchester was considered nothing more than a political or media stunt?
Or prank. She thought. Who will take the credit? Darren Brown or David Copperfield? She considered. After all, both might be able to pull off some similar stunt for entertainment.
But this wasn't entertainment to those that lived there. She acknowledged to herself.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
The disappearance of Wellington Medical Center as people were want to call it was credited as a combined effort of a political and media stunt. The Daily Mail and the National Enquirer insisted on the narrative of an alien invasion although those sources were considered less than credible. The Prime Minister, Theresa May, berated the paparazzi for the spectacle and leaks for which she called 'baseless' for which the intent was to cause panic in London.
Indeed, it did. Much like the urban legend of the 'War of the Worlds', where it was thought that people took fright when aliens were attacking the earth on a mass scale, the same comparison was made with London. Businesses shut down and people scurried home. Some fled the City fearing another disappearance.
Certain religious groups thought it might have been the very first stage of the Rapture and sought the sanctity of churches.
But following the event, Londoners despised being made to appear like fools.
Rebekah could only stare at the news streaming through her BBC app on her iPhone, clenching her teeth as President Trump called the media upfront 'fake news' and turned his attention to other matters on Twitter. Those in the UK were not so swayed. Theresa May was eager for the publicity when the drama unfolded during the disappearance but then teetered the other direction, content to unburden herself of the blame to the press.
She found herself called on the carpet by the other members of parliament as people took to protest in anger on the streets. She had lost Member of Parliament seats in the last SNAP election. Her prospects looked far grimmer now given the debacle.
The brunette licked her lips feeling partially aghast. Political spectacle? She asked herself. Fake news? She had seen the pictures. How was any of that just a 'stunt'?
But people at her work moved on. Since there was no terrorism, and no one could lay blame to ISIS or a White Supremacist group, they didn't want to dwell on it. Rebekah took to asking Staci who had been so certain when she announced the news.
"There's probably an explanation." The woman said distractedly, staring at her monitor. "Does it matter?"
"Staci, a hospital disappeared for hours and then showed back up. You don't find that strange?"
"No." Staci blinked. "I mean, that's not what happened. They say it never vanished at all. Just faulty reports and politicians acting like idiots. Not really surprising to me."
The way she and her co-workers cast it off was baffling. "But it doesn't make sense. Something like that doesn't happen every day."
"Oh, sure it does, sweetie. Remember the incoming missile alert in Hawaii. They panicked but it ended up being a load of crap."
Of course Rebekah remembered the missile alert, which caused hundreds of thousands of residents in Hawaii to struggle to prepare for their own demise. Was that truly a good parallel to this situation? She shook her head and slowly walked away as she stared at her phone. She read staff stories from Wellington Hospital attesting to the fact that nothing happened except for a loss of their Wi-Fi for a good few hours. Daunting to many but hardly a life or death crisis.
It seemed so entirely credible. Ill-advised reports or leaks. The wrong location and address reported. After all, Rebekah had the entire misfortune of having to go to Wellington Medical Center when she fell down an escalator at the Paddington Station. The entire time of her visit, she felt overwhelmed by trepidation and disdained the place for a reason she couldn't entirely fathom. Now it was in the news.
These events sounded eerily similar although it defied reason. Anxiety cramped her stomach as she looked on her desk at the location where the missing TARDIS had occupied.
No. She told herself. She wouldn't accept events in rag magazines as factual because she had been taught to look for credible sources. That would be an insult to her intelligence. Distantly, she remembered how the Eleventh Doctor would peruse for information in Victorian London among Street Prophets in 'The Snowmen'.
She bit her tongue fiercely as a sharp reprimand. Rebekah wasn't experiencing the events of a television show. She knew she wasn't. This was real life. Brutal, raw, painstaking and agonizing but all the same, real. There was no slipping through cracks into another reality. Such things she would have recollected.
Besides, if she entertained such notions, she would rightly be judged as truly insane.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
She checked with Denise, the administrator for their building whether her TARDIS had turned up only she referred to it at a pewter British telephone booth jewelry box. Given the reaction, most of her office didn't know about the show Doctor Who or much less other British television shows. Staci and Maria, who worked with the treasury department watched the BBC Sherlock but that was the limit to their cultural indulgences.
She was met with profound disappointment when Denise informed her that nothing had turned up, pewter or otherwise. The item had been sentimental, bought shortly after her father's death. For a time, she kept only the jewelry that he had bequeathed to her within it. An amber topaz ring, a blue topaz and diamond heart necklace since he had taken to giving heart shape jewelry as a symbol of his affection. A Baroque style pearl necklace, which differed from the typical ordinary pearl in the sense that it was a misshapen, lumpy fresh water pearl.
These things were precious to her. Reminders but hardly fitting replacements of the man she dearly loved so it was with some disappointment that the TARDIS had likely been stolen, never to be seen again.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
Rebekah sat on a seat on BART, the mass transit train that made its way into San Francisco to pay a visit to her brother. During the summer, he lived the life of a single adventurer while her niece and sister in law spent their time in Spain. Truthfully, she knew he was a devoted father but still had the mind to have fun just as in all his former years. But these meetings were strained given that their past was not very cordial. Certainly, on her part, forgiveness seemed to be easy to offer. Forgetting her abuse and indignity was more complicated. How does one forget? Rebekah mused and looked at her laptop. She was simply writing in her journal, which she kept as a word document and wrote occasionally as the mood struck her since the time her father had been bedridden in hospice. In looking over those entries from that period, she did not seem like herself.
Who is that anyway? She thought and then she started to type. 'If I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly knotted to a similar string situated in the corresponding quarter of your frame, if you were to depart, I am afraid that cord of communion will snap and I will take to bleeding inwardly.' I am bleeding inwardly just as Charlotte Bronte composed and the events of the last few days amplify it. Nothing seems real. First, someone stole my TAR—
"Jane Eyre." Someone spoke from behind her, with a tone distinctly familiar but she couldn't place. "Love that book. Would you believe I have the original? Also, read it two thousand and thirty-two times at my last count but I might have forgotten. You write very well and—"
"Excuse me." She hadn't yet turned. Seriously, was this really happening for the fourth time on BART? Where is the respect of privacy? "Are you completely deficient of manners that you would read someone's private writing without even asking consent or do you not take consent seriously? What is your—" She was about to say 'problem' but had swiveled to face the stranger head on and her throat went dry. She was dumbstruck for a moment and then felt heat rising to her face. Shame and embarrassment. Oh God, going off on David Tennant of all people! She would never live this down. Was anyone else on the train watching the scene or recording this with their phones?
No. Not yet. The few people there hadn't yet seen him. So far, that little piece of luck was on her side. "I'm sorry." She rectified immediately. "I…I didn't see you."
He waved his hand diffidently, raising his eyebrows at her sudden change in demeanor. "She always told me I was rude. Didn't really listen."
"Sorry?" Rebekah asked in confusion. "Who?"
He grinned, seeming to switch in an instant from one mood to another, like lightning. "Doesn't matter. Mind if I sit here?"
"Well, I guess-"
"Perfect." He simply pushed in beside her as she struggled to snatch her San Francisco State sweatshirt from the accompanying seat before he sat on that as well as her laptop case. She managed to extricate one of them but wasn't quick enough for her case and he seemed not to notice that he was sitting on the lumpy bag. "So, what's your name?"
No one. She thought miserably but knew that wouldn't suffice. However, given the predicament, she didn't want her real name to be associated with her own disrespect to the actor. So, she contrived a fictional one, ready-made that she'd previously used. What did it matter? He wouldn't know the difference.
"Sara Thomas." She said after a moment, thinking of her own story 'Lost in Time'. It would work as an effective alias.
"Brilliant. Lovely name. I'm the Doctor."
She glanced quickly at the man still sitting on her laptop case. Of course. He was in costume.
Perhaps he was in town for a convention. She hadn't heard of one specifically but then, there were reasons she kept out of San Francisco and didn't track events as she used to. The violence that erupted occasionally due to counter protestors and rioters did not act as an effective draw. She didn't relish being hit by misfired rocks again.
But all the same, she didn't feel up to playing. Was she being recorded? She sighed. It wasn't her first or even second encounter with actors. Her best friend worked as a public relations officer for television and movie sets to advise on accuracy. She had benefited from Beth's role and even been to the Emmys. She knew they could be…eccentric. Rebekah fell quiet, uncertain as how to respond. She wasn't up to the pretense of asking 'Doctor Who?' but all the same, he would expect her to say something.
"How very rewarding." She managed a conservative response that she hoped would satisfy the situation.
"Americans." He muttered. "Thought you lot were a lot more curious. Outspoken. 'Give me liberty or give me—"
"Perhaps you should visit elsewhere." She advised. "I suppose I've forgotten my pride." She started to stand up seeing that they were approaching the Embarcadero exit. It wasn't her intended departure point but she felt disconcerted from being here. "This is me." She gestured to the door.
"Sara." He said, from behind her. "I'm just lost."
"What? Lost? I don't know what you mean. I—"
"Cemeteries. Do you know where yours is?"
"Cemeteries. In San Francisco?" Rebekah asked, askance.
"Yes, the one with statues."
"You mean Mission St. Delores Cemetery. It's—"
"Perfect!" He rolled back on his heels and suddenly ran to the exit without so much as a 'goodbye'.
"But that's the wrong—" The doors of the train closed behind him. "Exit." She finished. That was maddening. If he was searching for that cemetery, it was on the opposite end of the City. She licked her dry lips, thinking she would get off at the next station and take an Uber the rest of the way to her brother's apartment when she felt something hit her foot.
Glancing down, she saw a long, tube like, metallic object and she picked it up to examine it.
"Oh you must be kidding." A toy sonic screwdriver. Well, it had to be a toy or prop. Quickly, she shoved it into her laptop bag and stared at the sliding doors for which he just departed. She dearly hoped wherever he was heading, he wouldn't require it.
But who knew really? Trying to fathom the actor's motivations was not how she wanted to spend her day after all, she had readily humiliated herself. She asserted to herself that she would try to put this event behind her.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
"So, first of all the United States owns Puerto Rico, so we are part of the United States."
They had been spending a pleasant enough afternoon at Delores Park until the next table over, a woman in her late twenties with the Puerto Rican flag emblazoned in her shirt was being hassled by a man walking in the inebriated, staggering stride of one who was so clearly wasted.
A police officer was in the nearby vicinity. He turned to watch the exchange but did not step in to intercede. Nothing.
"We don't own Puerto Rico." The drunkard argued. "They're not part of us. Are you even educated?"
The poor girl tried to speak but was cut off. "Why does he protect Puerto Rico?" He snarled. "We don't own it. It's not a state, as in the United States of America."
"Okay." The girl drew the word out into several syllables, clearly disgusted not wishing to continue the exchange. It appeared she had a cake box in tow. She was celebrating a birthday.
"So what's your point now?" He challenged.
"Well, what's your point, sir?" The woman asked.
"My point is why are you wearing that?" He indicated towards her shirt.
"Because I can." She stated as she glanced at the nearby police man for help. "Officer can you please help? I have a permit to use this area."
"You're not renting any of this." He accused.
"I did rent it. Could you please step away from me, sir?" She looked pleadingly at the officer who still did nothing.
"You need to have a permit."
"I do have a permit." She paused. "Officer, this man is harassing me. Could you please grab him?" and truth be told, he was getting fearfully close.
"You're not going to change us, you know."
"I'm not trying to change you. If you just leave me alone—"
Rebekah stepped forward in her defense. "What is your problem?" She asked. "Puerto Rico is part of the United States. She," she gestured to the girl, "is an American and is proud of her origins."
"She should not be wearing that in the United States of America."
"Right." The brunette glared at him. "America first, right?"
"That's right. Born and bred." He stated with pride.
"So, why are you wearing clothes made in Bangladesh, especially after a fire broke out in their factory killing over a hundred people?" She paused.
"Who cares about that?" He muttered but looked a little stupefied.
"Perhaps you should change first, considering your clothes are less patriotic than what she's wearing." Her voice was cool.
"Libtard traitor." He spewed. "This city is a shithole and…" he paused. "What are you doing?" He demanded.
"Calling the police. You approached her threateningly when she had a permit to use the space." She finally put down the phone in her purse. "They'll be here in five minutes." She glared at him. "And I'm a moderate, just so you know."
She didn't hear the slap coming. It rang inside her head and muffled the sound in her ears. She clutched her face, looking at the person in outright shock, unable to find the words in response. Not with the pain she currently resided in. What had he been thinking?
"Commy traitor." He spewed amongst other foul language she didn't care to hear.
She felt the pain and indignation boiling inside her worse than before. How much more could she take? She had watched her father die and then in quick succession two friends dear to her. Her last year had been spent going to funerals! It seemed like an endless parade of coffins and memorial services. Then she endured the uncertainty and fear of the Northern California fires for which her relatives and co-workers went missing. And it seemed that through the whole of that tedium, there were those that were apathetic to the disaster or worse; they celebrated it. California was finally getting their comeuppance. A shithole state indeed.
She lost sight in the single injury dealt to her in that moment and her temper unduly flared, wishing too he would her repay for every thought and unkind deed she had endured. She couldn't think through that anger nor try to temper herself. To her coming regret, she didn't even try.
I wish….
Suddenly the street lamps sparked and sizzled. Glass flew every which way. No!
She felt panic. Shards hit the man who was perpetrating such bile and she saw the blood.
The glass and plastic casing protecting the lamps had broken free and tore into her sweatshirt, grazing her arms. He was clutching his face and she couldn't tell with all the blood whether his eye was injured or….
She felt nausea at the coppery smell of blood. Oh, she despised what he was saying but she didn't want this. How could this have occurred? Her mind was struggling to work through the quandary but she felt something. An object was warm against her leg. Very warm. She was reminded of the times when her phone or laptop became overheated but they weren't powered on and were kept safe in her laptop bag, dangling from her shoulder.
So, what else could it be?
In a daze, she fumbled in the pocket of her bag and gasped as her hand contacted the cylinder tube of which David Tennant had dropped when he ran off to, well…she assumed his convention since he had taken pains to get into character for the event in the few minutes he spent with her. She lifted it out and could only stare at it. The item was alit. It wasn't limited to the blue light at the very end of the sonic but the silver tube radiated a diffuse light that warmed further under her hand.
And then to her own shock and horror, she saw numbers and letters streaming on the surface similar to a three-dimensional pattern as she was used to seeing in her work with graphics on a topographical scale but this was even more defined. They appeared to her as solid objects but as she ran her hand over them…nothing. There was no substance to them.
She was filled with disbelief at the very evidence in her hand.
One she couldn't ignore.
It wasn't a toy. Not a replica or a prop.
It was real.
She dropped it back in her bag, sinking to the ground, feeling as though she would hyperventilate. If this was real than the man she met on the train who she took as David Tennant…
No! She thought in desperation. No! No! No!
Her vision blurred in front of her. She didn't come back to herself until she was faced with a paramedic who had been trying to gain her attention for the last five minutes.
"I'm fine." She managed.
He didn't believe her and she couldn't say she really blamed him.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
"Any pain?" The emergency room physician asked as he performed the sutures on her arm.
Rebekah glanced up at him, torn away from her thoughts. "No." She said quietly. "Just, um…sorry."
"Sorry?"
"Sorry it happened."
"I think the City will be sorrier since they will likely be footing the bill. The media and attorneys are already circling this event. Of course, the County is trying to place blame on the Utility Company but when they call you—"
"Call me?" She looked up in panic. Did they already know she was at fault? Her stomach cramped at the mere thought.
"Of course they'll call you and that inebriated fool." Dr. Cole rolled his eyes. "They'll want to make a settlement offer."
Settlement. She had to piece the sense of it together and then realized. Of course. Money to dismiss any liability against them. But it's a lie. She couldn't do it. Not a lie like this. She wasn't even up to half truths at this point. What was the point? Something horrific had happened to bring the Doctor into her reality. Her existence.
But what? Everything else seemed the same. Her family was still her family. There were no cracks. No white lights. Nothing that might explain this.
Then still, events had proceeded this, which she had determinedly sidelined. Her disappearing pewter TARDIS. The vanishing and reappearance of Wellington Medical Center, which was blamed on a combined attempt of a political stunt of Theresa May and the media. And despite the inconsistency of that information, she simply accepted it because she was educated to only use 'credible sources'.
My disappearing TARDIS. She thought shakily. When did that happen? When did I notice that? A week ago? Two?
"Rebekah?" Dr. Cole asked, attempting to get her attention. "I have discharge paperwork and instructions to follow for—"
"It's my fault." She blurted out, cutting him off mid-sentence.
"What is?" He asked in confusion.
"The lamps. I didn't mean it. He hit me and…"
Dr. Cole paused. He wasn't told there was a head injury and his patient hadn't volunteered information until just now. He sighed. "We should order an MRI."
"No!" She couldn't do that, having developed Claustrophobia from her experiences with her father who had endured many hospital visits and MRI's. She knew the pain they caused him and born witness to several medical procedures that even walking through a hospital for her best friend's expected birth was a trial in anxiety.
She saw the physician's puzzled expression. "You may have a concussion. It is only a precaution." He advised candidly.
"I meant…" She licked her lips. "No. About the lamps. I did it." She knew it was pointless to attempt to avail herself of protection by any means of local authority. If the Doctor was real… Oh God, the Doctor is real. The chills went right down her spine. But what could she do? Her perfidy with the lamps and the sonic would soon be discovered regardless. She had to reconcile herself to her fate, wherever that may lead.
Slowly, she reached into her laptop bag, took hold of the sonic and extended it toward Dr. Cole with one hand as she felt herself quaver in trepidation.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
+++SI++DW++SI+++
It's just down the road. Wouldn't get much. Just to take the edge off… But Helene knew that it was a lie. She'd make some excuse to buy a larger—or the largest—bottle of whatever alcohol perked her fancy at the time then go home to drink it.
It had started off small. Just a third of a shot to help her sleep. Then two-thirds. Then a full shot. Her low tolerance for alcohol became much higher. Excuses to drink started with helping her sleep, then to help with pain, then became a desire for the taste itself. She liked it. Liked how it made her feel.
But she knew it was a slippery slope. She'd always known but didn't think it would get so bad so fast. Though perhaps not so fast. A few years in the making.
Yet here she was, thinking that the excuse of her period starting was good enough to go get another bottle. Just the small one. Long Island Iced Tea is good. And she had only finally drained the fifth of Vanilla Crown Royal the night before.
Helene had a good idea of why she drank, and it wasn't just for the taste. It was the effect. It made her not care as much. She could be at least momentarily content with her life as it was currently. Only her job in her life. Bored. An endless sea of stupidity and students in front of her. Lonely.
Irony loved her so much. She had moved in next door to her parents because she'd known that it was the only way she'd move out of the house at all. Her parents, her father in particular, was too overprotective to allow anything else. Yet since she'd moved last August, making this her one-year anniversary—That's a good reason to drink. Celebration! —she barely saw her parents anymore. Not even in passing. The idea of family dinners once a month had been tossed out, but nothing became of it. They didn't visit and she now felt that going over to the main house without an express invitation was an intrusion.
She wanted to forget, if only for a little while, that she wasn't happy. She wasn't sure if she was in fact miserable, but she knew she wasn't happy. She didn't even think she was content. Though she also knew that life could be so very worse. She'd lived through such after all. Ugh, Her. Excellent reason for a drink. But those years were behind her. Shouldn't her life be more...more?
With such depressing thoughts, is it any wonder I probably drink more than I should? However, alcohol was a depressant, so not such a good thing to drink to get happy. She was a happy drunk though. Not as much as happy as lately she'd wanted to be.
While at work, it wasn't difficult to push aside thoughts of the beverage, but when she got in her car and prepared to go home, niggling thoughts began to intrude. She doubted that was a good sign.
She'd been playing with the idea that she might be an alcoholic for a few months. Her therapist hadn't been helpful in the least with a diagnosis either. 'You're an alcoholic if you feel like one,' indeed. Not helpful! So she had tried to cut back on her drinking and had been marginally successful. But trying to cut it out completely was so far at 28 hours and counting. She really wanted to go get a new bottle. Just something to tide me over until my period stops. Which she knew would be a lie. She wasn't in too much pain at the moment. But if I wait until I'm in too much pain to go to the store, then what will I do? You know the second and third days are worse. Go get a bottle while you can!
There were so many reasons why not to get that new bottle. Health. Weight gain. She was already 40 pounds overweight. It wasn't going to get better with the amount she'd been drinking regularly. She'd kept a small cold for months now since her immune system didn't seem to get a boost because of the alcohol consumption.
Yet the thoughts gnawed at her…
It wouldn't take much, she knew. Just a little splash in the bottom of her liquid measuring cup. And since it was a school night and she had work in the morning, it would stay at just a splash. Right? I can hold onto my self-control that much. Can't I? Shit. It almost sounded like she was talking herself into getting a bottle, not out of it.
Take her mind off things. Reading! She loved to read. She'd go find something new...
But after 20 minutes of searching with zero interest in anything catching her eye, she stopped. Sighed. Her brain discontented, tired, and… Loneliness clawed at her. Just as much as her boredom with those around her. They were just so...stupid. Even the ones that weren't as stupid as the others seemed to enjoy complaining for the sake of complaining, without any expectation of resolving issues. That bothered her more than the stupidity.
She recalled the recent phone call to get her car fixed. It went along the lines of
"When would you like to bring in your vehicle?"
"I'm not available Tuesday or Thursday. Otherwise, you tell me and I'll show up."
"Alright-y, not a problem. How about tomorrow?"
"...Tomorrow is a Thursday."
It had devolved from there. She finally got a straight answer from the man who brought her car at 7:30 am on Friday, despite the fact she'd be able to pick up a rental car for the in-between time to get her from her job and then to return home… It was nice, the rental cars. They reminded her how much she liked her own vehicle. No big bells or whistles, just a good car. No vibrating steering wheel that she was getting close to a white line and scaring the crap out of her. No annoyingly persistent dinging noise to tell her that her seatbelt was unfastened while she got the gate to the property; their driveway just long enough to constantly hear that damned noise. Though, to be fair, the butt-warmers built into the newer car seats were awesome. Her Lexi didn't have those. Whomever thought of seat-warmers was a genius. And unknown genius she would never meet...
"Son of a bitch!" Helene growled and finally got out of bed. She'd go get the damned bottle.
Maybe it was an adult version of a security blanket.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
When she got back to the house, Helene very carefully measured out one ounce of Long Island Iced Tea—she had managed to talk herself out of the largest bottle on the way there and only got the small bottle, which was a bit of a victory in itself. 1.5 ounces constituted a shot of alcohol and what she had was a mixed drink, so one ounce on a school night didn't make her an alcoholic.
Right?
But there again, she knew she had become tolerant enough in her consumption that one ounce wasn't going to give her the small buzz she sought. She had steadily gotten an exponential increase in her tolerance the last few months. Now if she wanted to even get a bit tipsy, she'd need to drink a couple of glasses of the Tea. However, if she was to successfully convince herself that she wanted the taste more than the buzz, a single ounce would have to do.
Regardless of how she wanted to swallow the one ounce down in a single mouthful and pour herself another.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
Life conspired against her sometimes.
A couple months previous had lost her a long-standing friendship. Everything had gone to hell after that. Though she supposed it had been before that the trouble started. The large work project she'd been part of at the time had soaked up all her mental energy to the point where she could barely think straight in which to teach and even some of those days had left her blank. Standing in front of the white board with an absolute blank in her mind. Not good; though her students had thought it was funny.
It took Helene about two days to figure out how much she had been relying on Bekka to help stabilize herself. She'd never noticed before the blow-up. Yes, she shared blame in that she'd been a bit vague in how she'd initially sent the email that instigated the whole thing, but it had snowballed on her so damned fast she was still reeling two months later. In the space of a couple hours she had gone from a three-year friendship to a nothing-ship.
She still wasn't sure why. It ate at her. Why didn't she send another email?
But it also was so strange. Bekka had a weird habit of apologizing for things that didn't matter. Yet when something like this happened, the woman was confrontational, accusatory, and outright mean. Helene had almost called the cell phone number she had—if only to say 'what the hell?!' —but stopped herself before she could finish the motions. She'd tried to call Bekka a couple times before and had never gotten through. That had been when Rebekah had supposedly liked her. Now? Highly doubtful.
So Helene got to understand how often she thought of Bekka and how much she emailed the woman about...well, pretty much everything. Now, with the finality of their nothing-ship, that was taken from her. Helene didn't have many friends. Practically none. She had acquaintances and coworkers. That was it. She never developed the skill of 'social butterfly'; she'd been the strange, weird kid who got good grades, whose nose was in a book, and watched clouds for an alien spaceship to take her away.
Helene sighed, felt the yawning echo of loneliness and went to pour herself another ounce of Tea.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
She had no idea when it happened, but sometime in the last few weeks, someone had delved into her office and stolen her Doctor Who coloring book. She didn't know because coloring as saved for special occasions when she felt the need to unwind. The last time she had colored was when the summer semester had just started.
Now a new unfortunate occasion there was a pedantic fellow coworker had decided to take it upon herself, with absolutely no warning, to clean out the break room refrigerator. On the surface, there was nothing wrong with that. Even commendable. But Jean had thrown away food that was perfectly fine—pickles; food that didn't have an expiration date because it never went bad—as well as Helene's own freshly-bought-just-that-morning lunch. Helene was understandably angry, but Jean couldn't manage to care despite Helene's complaints.
Thus, Helene had opened the drawer she kept her secret coloring book at work...and saw nothing but the coloring pencil packet. "What?" she whispered. Who would steal a coloring book? The only people who should have a key was herself, Vina, the coordinator of the building who liked her, the utility maintenance workers, cleaning staff, and campus security. She sighed. She'd never seen a coloring book like it and likely never would again. Which was probably why it had been taken.
Her squishy Adipose stress-toy was also gone.
There was no use in filing a complaint either. Being a modern-day tattle day was frowned upon and it would cause her coworkers to despise her for such a lapse in judgment and she was already skating on thin ice in her profession. She took a deep breath knowing she would just deal with it.
"To hell with it, I'll see if I can find another," she muttered and turned back to her laptop.
However, a quick Amazon and eBay search for 'Doctor Who coloring book' yielded no hits. Not just no DW coloring books, but it brought up odd things. Dr. Strange and other Marvel coloring books. Dr. Octopus with Spiderman coloring books. Star Trek featuring Dr. McCoy and Dr. Crusher. Dr. Nick from the Simpsons. Dr. Gregory House.
Lots of doctors, but nothing Doctor Who. Not even non-coloring book DW paraphernalia.
It was as if Doctor Who wasn't an extremely popular television series. Which it was. Huge; even in the U.S. Which also didn't quite make sense as even esoteric items could be found on Amazon. Out of commission items could (usually) be found on eBay. So why…?
"Weird," she said.
However, since she wasn't much of a coloring book person, Helene shut down her laptop and made her way home. It was Friday. She'd pour herself a shot of Vanilla Crown Royal, settle down, and write a (hopefully polite) email to Jean about posting a sign for a couple days beforehand the next time the woman got the itch to clean out the fridge.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
Helene was reaching to put on her earrings one day, getting ready for work, when she noticed that her three sets of Doctor Who earrings were missing. She had a pair of Weeping Angels, a pair of "timey-wimey wibbly-wobbly" written in Gallifreyan circle-script, and a pair of little TARDIS'. All were gone.
She frowned at the spot, not liking the idea that someone could've broken into her home. But she hadn't noticed anything else taken and her DW earrings were certainly not the most expensive items in her house. Nothing most would even think to steal. Her television was at least four times more valuable.
It was like the coloring book and Adipose squishy. Just…gone.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
"Sam?" Helene asked when she saw the red-headed woman walking down the hall. "Have you seen my DW earrings lately? I've lost them."
Samantha was one of the few people she knew who had Doctor Who addiction. Samantha was even worse than Helene herself; Sam had dressed as the Eleventh Doctor last year and taken personal time to attend WhoCon. So involved was she, that she had constructed her own hand-made costume to celebrate the event.
Which made Sam's reaction to the question all the more shocking. "What? What is D-W?" The way she carefully pronounced the letters indicated her lack of recognition.
"…" Helene stared at her colleague. "Doctor Who?" she asked hesitantly, piecing the words out as if they were separate sentences. As if that would help her coworker to remember.
"Doctor Who," Sam answered as if she was asking a question. Or confirming what she had heard.
"An alien travels to other times and planets. Has adventures." She was getting a bad feeling. A really, really bad feeling.
Sam grinned. "Adventures make one late for supper," she quoted the Tolkien.
"Right," Helene said. She didn't know what else to say. The shift from one highly-popular fandom to another making her mind go blank. Other than the two sharing the 'fiction' category, they weren't much alike at all. Science fiction versus fantasy.
"Sorry about your earrings, but I can't remember seeing any laying around. I'll keep an eye out though." Sam gestured back the way she'd been facing. "I gotta get to class."
"Yeah. Take care." Helene nodded and made her way to her office, her mind reeling with the new bits of information.
It was over the next two weeks that Helene had been unscrupulous and asked anyone and everyone about Doctor Who, trying to find at least one individual who remembered the show. She eventually came to the conclusion that she was the only one, but that nothing else seemed to have changed in the world around her. However by the time she came to such, her parents had already begun to worry about her sanity with her seemingly erratic behavior and insisted she see a therapist. Though she already saw one on an as-needed basis.
Her coworkers also told her to see a therapist. And her boss. In the end, Helene went to shut them up. They couldn't legally make her, but it was a good idea so that she'd still have a job next year. While they couldn't fire her for this, they could decide not to re-hire her. She rather liked being able to pay her bills, thank you very much.
Thus started a chain of psychologists and eventually her meeting one Dr. Lecter. She gave a small at the likeness of the name but the photograph on his website was different. The man was in his fifties.
+++SI++DW++SI+++
Helen sighed as she was going through her shelves, trying to empty another couple boxes and put things away. She still couldn't find her previous writing journal. It had vanished into some box somewhere during the move and the Lord only knew where it might be. If it had even made it to the house! She was seriously starting to wonder at this point, almost a year since she had moved in.
It was as she was clearing off the highest shelf by her fireplace that a small flat black wallet fell. Her eyes had caught the movement as it slid off the pile of papers she had grabbed, reached too slowly to catch it before it hit her on the head, but fast enough so that the wallet didn't go much farther. "Ow," she muttered, though she wasn't hurt. It was just a verbal reflex.
She frowned at the thin bit of leather. "What?" she asked the air. It was the psychic paper that Rebekah had sent her some months previous. Looking similar to the first time she'd seen it and stuck it on the shelf. She hadn't used it, merely keeping it as a souvenir, because she needed the larger checkbook-size to carry in her purse for her checkbook and various cards which were too numerous for the smaller wallet.
"What?" she asked again. All the other Doctor Who stuff has vanished into thin air. No one remembers the Doctor…and yet here is the toy psychic paper wallet. It doesn't make sense! Why would this still be here if everything else disappeared? She'd gone through all the Doctor Who items she kept out and it had all vanished. From her Doctor Who earrings, to her Doctor Who t-shirts (a favorite was her Winnie the Pooh dressed as the Fourth Doctor, her favorite shirt; another was Pikachu as the Tenth Doctor and blue screwdriver), a large printout of a Doctor Who themed My Little Pony picture she'd found on the internet, an Eleventh Doctor plushie, four coffee mugs, two alarm clocks, and half a dozen keychains. All vanished without a trace from various locations. Her home, her car, and her office.
Also, she'd checked. No Doctor Who stories she'd printed out and stuck in binders were around. The binders were still there, but they didn't hold anything. Any bookmarks she'd saved in Google Chrome for Doctor Who stories had been deleted. Any stories she'd copy-pasted into Word or OneNote and saved on her hard-drive were gone, as well as deleted from her backup thumb drives.
The Doctor Who fandom had vanished from and Twisting the Hellmouth. 'A Teaspoon and an Open Mind', the main Doctor Who-only fanfiction website no longer existed at all. 'My Mad Man with a Box', a subsection of Wattpad, had disappeared.
All gone.
Now the psychic paper wallet was staring at her. In her hand.
She flipped it open. She didn't know why she did so. Probably out of curiosity. It wasn't as if she'd put anything in it. The item still should have its tags. She'd never used it after all.
Except…it didn't.
And it wasn't empty.
"Oh my God," Helene's eyes grew terribly wide as she gazed down.
Originally, the toy that Bekka had sent her held two cards: one plain piece of blank paper (that was supposed to be the psychic paper) and an artificially aged library card for the First Doctor, his picture in a little square; along with several empty slots for other cards that the owner may need. It was a toy, but it was also made to use. Since she hadn't put anything in it, Helene hadn't cut off the tags. It had also been flexible to be used as the Doctor had in the show, flipping open and shut easily with just a twist of the wrist; yet it was new enough that it would prefer to be closed. One had to use a finger to keep it open.
However, the tags weren't there now. Not as if someone had cut them off recently, but as if they had never been there to begin with. She swallowed and twisted her wrist to check the flexibility of the leather. It bent with frightening ease. Snapping open and staying that way. As if it had been used for years just for this very purpose. The leather was obviously heavily used. Aged. Creased and wrinkled from wear.
It was the cards though that caught her attention the most. The one in the left pocket was blank, just as it had been before. But it wasn't just a blank card anymore. It had a…shimmer…that was visible even through the clear plastic covering. Like someone had taken the surface iridescence of soap bubbles and put it on paper. But with geometric designs.
"Fractals," she whispered, staring at the shimmering iridescent interlocking spirals of triangles. That were constantly moving. Even as she stared, the triangles moved. Gliding ever-so-slightly across the surface. It wasn't obvious or fast. Yet definitely occurring. In the space of thirty seconds it went from interlocking spirals of triangles to connecting six-pointed stars. Another minute and they had changed again to a more Celtic design of interweaving ribbons.
It was also pristine beneath those shimmering iridescent shapes; bright white with no wrinkles, creases, or torn edges.
Which was in direct contrast to the second card…and it was no longer a library card. The right side of the wallet now held a ratty and faded-wrinkled from excessive use and long age-a card with the Seventh Doctor's face on the left side.
Across the top it said: United Nations Intelligence Taskforce –– Identification Card .
The right side of the card read
Full Name: John Smith, Doctor
Professional Name: The Doctor
Place of Birth: Classified
Date of Birth: Classified
Rank: Scientific Adviser, UNIT UK
Number: 221176
Security Clearance: Majestic-12 & Above Top-Secret
Approved by: Brigadier A.G. Lethbridge Stewart (Officer Commanding, UNIT UK)
Slightly above the 'approved by' was the signature of the Brigadier General. Or was meant to be. Looked a bit like a stamp to her. A signature-stamp. Many officials who held lots of jobs that required their signature had one made for them to make things easier, faster, and more efficient.
There were no other slots for more cards.
If she didn't know better, she'd think she was holding a completely different wallet than the toy she'd been gifted with. Isn't that exactly what happened? It's…It's not a toy anymore… It took her mind less than a minute to absorb what she was seeing and come to the obvious conclusion.
It was REAL psychic paper. She was holding the REAL Doctor's wallet.
The Doctor is real here!
She'd come to the conclusion that she was more than likely in another version of reality. Another dimension. But nothing had really changed other than that the Doctor Who television show no longer existed. Everything else looked fine. History looked the same. (At least the major events she'd looked up had been identical to her memories.) Her parents still acted the way she always remembered. Everyone she knew were alive.
The only difference was the BBC show Doctor Who seemingly vanishing into thin air. She could live with that easily enough. It wasn't that big of a deal. It didn't impact her life overly much after all. Sure she missed the show, but it was fiction. An escape from reality. Entertainment for the masses.
Now though…
I'm holding the equivalent of a nuclear weapon!
"Oh God," Helene breathed as terror overcame her. If anyone knew… If they found out…!
She didn't think anyone would think badly of her when she grabbed the Long Island Iced Tea and began to swallow several mouthfuls directly from the bottle. Her mind was decidedly blank for long minutes as she drank, her eyes stuck on the item as if looking away would cause it to explode, and absorbed the new knowledge.
The Doctor.
He's real.
The Doctor is real.
The Doctor is REAL…
I've got his psychic paper.
I'm holding THE DOCTOR's psychic paper!
All my other Doctor Who stuff disappeared but my toy psychic paper is now real…..
Helene suddenly dropped the bottle on the counter, forgetting about it entirely as she bolted for her sewing room. She ran to a stack of boxes she'd sorted by month earlier and began to dig through them frantically.
Last Christmas her parents had given her a pile of Doctor Who toys. A few keychains, a bumper sticker a well-known actor, shirt, a bumper sticker, a TARDIS alarm clock…and the most critical; The Eleventh Doctor's sonic screwdriver...
+++SI++DW++SI+++
Author's Note: This is a co-written self inserted work between emptyvoices and Almadynis Rayne and we hope what you enjoyed reading so far that you leave feedback, good or bad. I know it's been a long time since I have written but prior stories for better or worse had to be put on pause. While this won't be like Lost in Time with Sara Thomas or about Almadynis's Nova Morganstein, this may reference them abstractly.
It is a self insert story but we do not anticipate it will take years in the writing. We are already working on chapter three and anticipate about ten-thirteen chapters depending. We hope you all give this new story a chance as it takes place in our present climate.
Reader beware, politics will be mentioned though we have done our best to keep them neutral but not deter from the truth. The event in the part was based on a real event recorded via a cell phone and San Francisco was refered to in a deratory manner also by another individual when he tried to harass Verizon employees on their ethnicity. If you wish, you can search for these videos on google.
And as always, my thanks to LovelyAmberLight for lending us her characterization as part of this story. She will only feature a small bit role in terms of writing in perhaps one or two areas. But she was kind enough to assist in the accuracy of her dialogue in future chapters.
May you all have a lovely Labor Day.