The Weary Traveller
All was quiet inside the time machine. The engines hummed away, travelling through the vortex to wherever it would land next. Where was that going to be? Who knew? Not even the Doctor, who had planned to take a short visit to Cryrones IV, to enjoy the snow beaches and possibly meander around the local lobster stalls. Not selling lobsters of course, but manned by them, selling the usual Sirius C constellation crap, Geodite crystals which usual failed at the test of dropping from a small height, videocards and little chunks of obsidian from the snow volcanoes.
But the TARDIS itself decided where it was going to land, and the Doctor had little motivation to try and change its mind. But wherever the TARDIS landed; adventure and usually a large amount of saving the universe awaited.
And soon enough, he would be thrown into chaos and danger more than he could ever imagine.
For the first time in as long as he could remember, the Doctor slept. In his spacious bedroom somewhere under the Chronon Fusion Chambers, he was collapsed on his bed which he hadn't used since he regenerated for the 5th time. There was a wilted piece of celery left on the bedside cabinet, and a glass of orange juice which had reverted to an orange, due to the background radiation of the time stream.
The TARDIS console and its surroundings had had a major overhaul since the Doctor's regeneration. Out with the wacky, in with the flashy and sleek. The whole console room had been turned white with the occasional chrome streaks running through the walls, and some bright LEDs which he had fixed into those hexagon things, shining onto the console unit itself. The console stood tall, and was cleaner than it had ever been, especially since that grunge stage he had gone through a couple of bodies back. Glass panels with the instruments on it, silver around the edges. Then in the middle, the time manipulator column, filled with flowing water, a change to the old design as it calmed him more now he was aging. He wasn't even sure how old he was anymore, the years had overcome him.
Slowly the water in the manipulator stopped flowing, indicating that they had landed, but whereabouts still unknown. The Doctor carried on sleeping, still unwoken by the landing. The TARDIS waited a few minutes until it decided to take matters into its own hands. It jetted a blast of cooled hydrogen onto the Doctor in an effort to wake him. It worked to say the least.
"JESUS CHRIST THAT'S COLD!"
The TARDIS hummed, almost complacently.
"Hmmph. Well, feel free to disturb the next sleep I have too." He muttered under his breath.
" I might as well sleep on Mondas, I'd prefer to be woken to chants of 'DELETE' than cold hydrogen jets to my face"
The Doctor paced upstairs into the shining console room, and retrieved a leather messenger bag from the seat. It used to be Clara's, but he had a feeling she wouldn't be back in a while since she had a family now and had gotten occupied in normal Earth stuff. "Well, it's her loss", he thought to himself.
In the meantime, the Doctor was using it as a storage bag, for general stuff and his sonic screwdriver. Ahh, his sonic screwdriver, it was possibly the best screwdriver he'd had in a long while, it wouldn't burn out anymore and it could do so many more things, including managing to undo deadlocks, which had come in unbelievably handy recently.
He took it out of its recharging box and slipped it into his inner pocket. Pacing to the door, he looked at the screen to see nothing but static, and set a mental reminder to configure the interdimensional camera correctly.
"Well, let's see what you got for me this time…" he grabbed the door handle, bracing himself for whatever could be outside.
Far from the expectations on rocks being hurled at the doors or a small cybernetic hurricane, he was met with the warm glow of sunshine. People walked past, smiling and happy. Everything seemed entirely normal. Striding forwards he found himself in a town square, with French flags hanging from a few buildings. There was a newspaper discarded on the edge of the fountain that read:
Le Monde Jeudi 13 Juillet 2017
Homme disparu à Paris Préparations jour Bastille en cours
"Man disappears in Paris… Bastille Day preparations…"
"We're not even that far into the future, nothing looks wrong, or at least out of the ordinary."
With a sigh, he tucked the newspaper under his arm, and went pacing in the direction of a bench to enjoy the sunshine. He felt he deserved an afternoon off, saving universes is hard work. People walked past, paying little attention to the ancient time lord, a young boy with his mother, a girl in a red dress, a man walking his dog…
He glanced down at the article again, the TARDIS written translators kicking in:
Man disappears in Paris
Reported by Keeley Haylett, Current Affairs Editor
High profile nuclear scientist Anton de Havernberg has gone missing shortly before a weapons conference between the New USSR and the G8 leaders, prompting fears in international authorities that there may be attempt to develop a highly experimental Plasma bomb in this new and relatively unstable state…
And then the picture of the missing scientist…
"Oh my god-"
And then it went dark.