The Investigator and the Traveler

As the sun began setting in Vancouver city, numerous RCMP officers surrounded a small apartment, keeping the civilians away as the yellow 'Keep Away' barrier was placed before them. A small hover car came into view and landed on the other side of the crowd. The lights on the car turned off and the driver's door opened, revealing a young looking girl, her brown hair tied up. She walked and moved herself through the crowd, when she came up to the barrier she found herself face to face with an RCMP officer. She held up a small, blank piece of paper.

"Clora Ridges: Private Investigator." She said.

The officer looked closely at the paper.

"Can you let me through?" She asked.

The officer nodded and pulled the holographic barrier up, allowing her through.

"Thank you." She said, putting the blank piece of paper away. "What happened here? Why is an apartment being cleared off?"

The officer followed as they slowly walked over to the apartment.

"Someone called for help on the 911 line but suddenly hung up before we could find out the exact situation. An officer was sent and found everyone inside the building dead, he immediately called for backup."

"How did they die?" She asked, her attention completely on the building.

"See for yourself." The officer replied. Clora opened the door that lead inside, she stopped and looked at the dark room, only a few lights were on and they were focused on the bodies. Two men and a woman, lying dead on the floor while numerous people investigated them. Clora walked to one of them, the officer stood next to her. She kneeled and looked at the body closely. No wounds, no signs of discolored skin, nothing to show how he died.

"Aside from the fact that he's… well, you know… Dead. He looks perfectly fine." The officer said.

"And yet, he's dead." Clora stated, she looked up at him. "Nothing in the air?"

"Why would there be?"

"Maybe poisoned somehow?"

"Medical officers are busy scanning the building for any signs of poisonous products that may have entered any of the bodies. They've scanned over half the people in here and, so far, found nothing."

Clora stood up.

"There's no apparent reason why they died. And yet, someone called 911 which means at least one person knew something was going on. They didn't all just fall over and die at once, they died at different periods, albeit very short periods. Officer… Oh, what's your name?"

"Officer Atrix, ma'am."

Clora faced Atrix.

"Interesting last name." She said, then her voice went serious again. "Do you know what the person sounded like when he or she called."

"Uh, no I don't."

"Got a recording? Anything?"

"No, ma'am."

Clora looked away from the officer and looked at the body.

"Wonderful." She muttered. "Okay, the people here died for no reason but not at the same time and a person called 911 which means at least one of them knew something was wrong and tried to get help. But died before he or she had the chance to say why."

"If they did know." Atrix said.

"No. Always assume the victims know what happened."

"Who hired you? And how did you know of this so fast?" Atrix asked suspiciously.

"I don't answer those kinds of questions."

"You're going to tell me." He ordered.

"Oh really?" Clora turned and faced the man, who had a stern look on his face, Clora returned his look with a darker look in her eyes. Atrix seemed to notice and involuntarily took a step back. "How about this?" She said. "If I don't find anything useful, I'll tell you who sent me and how I found out about this so early."

Atrix merely nodded, then got a hold of himself. Clora looked at some stairs.

"Let's head to the upper levels and see what we find."

The next floor was no different, people looking over the bodies, trying in vain to figure out how they died. Clora continued up the next 3 floors and they were all exactly the same. She shook her head and continued up the stairs, but stopped when she felt Atrix grab her arm.

"They haven't scanned that part of the building yet." He warned.

"Then we'll be the first to see what's up there." She said, pulling her arm away and continuing up. Atrix stood for a moment, staring at the strange girl, then shook his head and followed. Clora opened the door that stood before her and looked through at the dark hall. She stepped in and walked through with Atrix, holding a flashlight, following. As they walked through the hall, Clora noticed that the shadows seemed to be moving at the corner of her eye, but she paid no heed. Atrix noticed as well but when he looked, everything was still. He drew his pistol as sweat starting forming on his brow. A loud Fwump! was heard up above, causing both the investigator and the cop to look up.

"That came from upstairs." Atrix said.

"Let's go see what it is." Clora said, and continued.

"Hold it, we need to wait for backup!"

Clora ignored him and continued on.

"Clora, wait!" She stopped. The way he said it, like he knew her for a long time, made her stop. She turned and faced him.

"What?"

"We don't know what's up there."

Clora's eyebrows lifted up. "We're going to find out."

Then, she went up the stairs and opened the door. This floor was different, everything was destroyed, walls broken down, tables and chairs overturned or in pieces and the shadows seemed more alive than ever. Clora calmly walked in and looked around. When Atrix entered with his flashlight, the light that touched the shadows sped away, a loud hissing noise being heard all around.

"What was that?" Atrix asked in a panicked tone.

"I think it was shadows." Clora said, staring blankly at the room, she reached into her coat and pulled out a pistol.

"Hey, where'd you get that?" The officer asked upon seeing the pistol.

"Don't focus on my gun focus on the fact that the hissing is getting louder." And she was right. The hissing was getting louder. Dark plumes moved out from the pitch black corners, twisting and writhing its way to the two people. Moving around the legs of Atrix, they suddenly tightened and pulled, causing him to trip and fall as he was dragged away, screaming. Clora looked up at surprise as the shadows lifted Atrix in the air.

"AAAAAAAAH! OH GOD, HELP ME!" He cried out. Clora aimed her pistol but couldn't see anything in the darkness. "OH GOD, SOMEONE! ANYONE! HEEELL-GRACK!" Clora thought she could see something impaling the officer and then dropping him. He landed on the ground with a Fwump! She noticed the shadows seemed to be moving to her. Clora aimed her pistol to it and fired. A bright green laser bolt screamed out and hit the ground, the shadows hissed away from the light of the bolt and the light the small little explosion generated. Clora smiled, figuring out there weakness. She side-stepped and grabbed the flashlight, aiming it at any moving shadows. As well as firing her pistol in areas where the flashlight was not. The hissing grew louder as Clora fended off the moving shadows. Then, she heard footsteps coming up behind her but she paid no attention.

"Oooh… That's brilliant!" A voice, a rather British voice, said next to her. Clora darted her head to the stranger. He was human, had white skin, short brown hair, and wore a long brown coat and was about a head taller than she was. Actually, she was a head shorter.

"Who are you?" She asked.

"I'm the Doctor." He said rather cheerfully, Clora then noticed he was carrying a strange, round white object. He then looked at the room and the hissing shadows. "…And that is a rather large and angry Shade, and this…" The man held up the object. "…Is a Gravity Globe!" He then threw the round object in the air, upon being thrown, the object lit up, illuminating the entire room. For only a moment, Clora saw pure darkness in bright light as the room seemed to shriek. Then, it disappeared. The Doctor breathed a sigh of relief.

"Is it… Dead?" Clora asked.

"No. It only ran off. But it is severely weakened, I need to find out where it's going." He then turned and left. Clora turned and followed. "Wait!" She called after him, the Doctor turned and faced her.

"Who are you?" She asked.

"I told you. I'm the Doctor."

"But… Doctor who?"

"Just the Doctor." Then, he continued down the stairs, leaving Clora to ponder. Just who is this guy? He seems awfully familiar with aliens. Is he with UNIT? Or Torchwood? She ran down the stairs but found no sign of the Doctor. Then, she heard it. A sound, a sound she could not describe but it was strange and yet, beautiful at the same time. It was loud at first but then faded away, Clora couldn't quite figure out where it was coming from.

Later…

Clora snuck out of the building, not wanting to have to explain how an RCMP officer was dead, she had checked Atrix's body and found no signs of how he could've died, which solves the mystery. The creature she had encountered was the one who killed all those people in the building. An alien? Yes, it was an alien of some kind. But who was this Doctor? Perhaps someone just like me: Lost… but fighting. She managed to get into her hover car and take off without anyone seeming to notice her and drove to her home in the North Van district. When she got home, she was instantly greeted by her white cat, Camille. Who meowed loudly for attention. Clora smiled and, after taking off her coat, picked up her pet. Camille rubbed her head against the cheek of her owner, purring loudly as she was stroked. Clora, carrying her cat, walked over to her computer desk. She settled down on the black chair that laid in front of the computer and put her cat on her lap, who quickly got comfortable and curled in a tiny ball, purring ever louder. Clora took a deep breath and went up to the internet search bar and typed in one word, one. Doctor.

She spent hours on the computer tracking down any info on this Doctor, cross-referencing files recovered from Torchwood and UNIT. There was definitely someone special marked in both of them, but whoever this person was, it was a closely guarded secret. Any files that might remotely have anything to do with the Doctor, if it was even the Doctor in the first place, was guarded by passwords and firewalls and other security programs. Clora was only good at finding things on the internet, not hacking through protected areas but if they had anything to do with this Doctor, she'd find it. Clora not only searched the UNIT and Torchwood files but also across the rest of the internet. That's when she found numerous sites all asking one question: Who is the Doctor? She searched the sites closely and found numerous pictures, some of different people who claimed they were called the Doctor and some of the man she had met in that building. But when she looked at the date the pictures were taken, she couldn't believe. One picture claimed it was taken in London on Christmas day, 2006 and another in 2007. That was over two hundred years ago! Clora sat farther back in her chair as she tried to figure it out. This is definitely the same man I met but… these can't have been taken over 2 centuries ago, it's impossible! She looked at the clock and noticed it was 3:30 AM. I need to get some sleep, I'll continue with this later.

Clora reached the button that would turn her computer off but before she pressed it, everything in her house turned off. Damn, a power outage. Oh well. Carefully picking up her cat. She took no more than a few steps when she heard a faint hissing sound. She looked around in the darkness for any moving shadows, nothing. But the hissing was slowly growing louder, making Clora nervous. Her pistol was by the door some distance away but she might be able to get at it before the shadows grab her and kill her. Clora gently put Camille down and hastily walked over to her front door. She reached in the coat for her pistol, after some searching she found it. That's when she noticed that the shadows seemed to move at the corner of her eye, the hissing growing louder. Alright, you little freak of nature, show me what you got. She looked around, they all seemed to be moving. She heard her cat growl somewhere in her living room. If you even think about touching my cat, you're going to regret it. Despite this thought, another thought in the back of her head told her she didn't stand a chance against the creature. She took a deep breath and aimed her pistol at a spot where she saw moving shadows and fired. She smiled when she heard loud hissing from the blast as the shadows sped away. She fired in another area, and another but, although it seemed to harming the creature, she felt the shadows in the dark areas of the house seemed to become more and more alive. Ah Damnit! If I survive this, I'm keeping my flashlights close to my pistol.

That's when the door opened, revealing the Doctor.

"Oh! 'Ello again!" He said. "Sorry to barge in on your place but, as you probably already know, the Shade was following you and is invading your home, I think it's best we get out of here!"

"What about my cat!" Clora asked urgently, firing another shot at the darkness.

"Cat? What cat!" The Doctor asked.

Clora then felt something move under her legs, she looked and saw Camille run out the door past the Doctor, who stepped to the side letting the cat through.

"Never mind. Once she's outside, nothing can catch her. Let's go."

She then ran out, following the Doctor who ran down the road.

"Will take my car and call the police!" Clora said.

"We can't go to the police." The Doctor said.

"What? Why not?"

"1: They don't know how to handle this sort of thing. 2: The Shade killed them all before finding you. 4- no, wait– 3: I know how to stop it. Plus, I've got something that's more dependable and safer than your car. Follow me!"

Clora didn't argue as she followed him down the street. I hope this guy really does know how to kill this thing. She thought as she a loud hissing noise was heard some distance behind her.